








HENRI RENE ALBERT 
GUY DE MAUPASSANT 

































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LIBRARY of CONGRESS 
Two Copies Received 

JUN 10 1904 

A Copyright Entry 

4>wt.a4 w^'4- 

CLASS A XXo. No. 
COPY B 


„ a* 


Copyright , 1904, 

M. WALTER DUNNE 

ENTERED AT STATIONERS* HALL, LONDON 


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CONCERNING 
GUY DE MAUPASSANT 


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F the French writers of romance of 
the latter part of the nineteenth cen- 
tury no one made a reputation as 
quickly as did Guy de Maupassant. 
Not one has preserved that reputation 
with more ease, not only during life, 
but in death. None so completely 
hides his personality in his glory. In 
an epoch of the utmost publicity, in 
which the most insignificant deeds of 
a celebrated man are spied, recorded, 
and commented on, the author of 
Boule de Suif, of Pierre et Jean , of 
Notre Cceur , found a way of effacing 
his personality in his work. 

Of De Maupassant we know that 
he was born in Normandy about 1850; 
that he was the favorite pupil, if one 
may so express it, the literary protege 
of Gustave Flaubert; that he made 
v 



De Maupassant 


his debut late in 1880, with a novel inserted 
in a small collection, published by Emile 
Zola and his young friends, under the title, 
The Soirees of Medan; that subsequently he 
did not fail to publish stories and romances 
every year up to 1891, when a disease of the 
brain struck him down in the fullness of pro- 
duction; and that he died, finally, in 1893, 
without having recovered his reason. 

We know, too, that he passionately loved 
a strenuous physical life and long journeys, 
particularly long journeys upon the sea. He 
owned a little sailing yacht, named after one 
of his books, Bel-Ami, in which he used to 
sojourn for weeks and months. These meager 
details are almost the only ones that have 
been gathered as food for the curiosity. 

I leave the legendary side, which is always 
in evidence in the case of a celebrated man, — 
that gossip, for example, which avers that 
Maupassant was a high liver and a worldling. 
The very number of his volumes is a protest 
to the contrary. One could not write so large 
a number of pages in so small a number of 
years without the virtue of industry, a virtue 
incompatible with habits of dissipation. This 
does not mean that the writer of these great 
vi 


Critical Introduction 


romances had no love for pleasure and had 
not tasted the world, but that for him these 
were secondary things. The psychology of 
his work ought, then, to find an interpretation 
other than that afforded by wholly false or 
exaggerated anecdotes. I wish to indicate 
here how this work, illumined by the three or 
four positive data which I have given, appears 
to me to demand it. 

And first, what does that anxiety to conceal 
his personality prove, carried as it was to such 
an extreme degree? The answer rises spon- 
taneously in the minds of those who have 
studied closely the history of literature. The 
absolute silence about himself, preserved by 
one whose position among us was that of a 
Tourgenief, or of a Merimee, and of a Moliere or 
a Shakespeare among the classic great, reveals, 
to a person of instinct, a nervous sensibility 
of extreme depth. There are many chances 
for an artist of his kind, however timid, or for 
one who has some grief, to show the depth 
of his emotion. To take up again only two 
of the names just cited, this was the case with 
the author of Terres Vierges and with the 
writer of Colombo,. 

A somewhat minute analysis of the novels 
vii 


De Maupassant 


and romances of Maupassant would suffice to 
demonstrate, even if we did not know the 
nature of the incidents which prompted them, 
that he also suffered from an excess of ner- 
vous emotionalism. Nine times out of ten, 
what is the subject of these stories to which 
freedom of style gives the appearance of 
health ? A tragic episode. I cite, at random. 
Mademoiselle Fiji , La Petite Roque , Inutile 
BeauU , Le Masque , Le Horla , L'Epreuve, 
Le Champ d’ Oliviers, among the novels, and 
among the romances, Une Vie, Pierre et 
Jean, Fort comme la Mort, Notre Coeur. 
His imagination aims to represent the hu- 
man being as imprisoned in a situation at 
once insupportable and inevitable. The spell 
of this grief and trouble exerts such a power 
upon the writer that he ends stories com- 
menced in pleasantry with some sinister 
drama. Let me instance Saint- Antonin, A 
Midnight Revel, The Little Cask, and Old 
Amable. You close the book at the end of 
these vigorous sketches, and feel how surely 
they point to constant suffering on the part 
of him who executed them. 

Maupassant has been called a literary nihil- 
ist — but (and this is the second trait of his 


Critical Introduction 


singular genius) in him nihilism finds itself co- 
existent with an animal energy so fresh and 
so intense that for a long time it deceives the 
closest observer. In an eloquent discourse, 
pronounced over his premature grave, Emile 
Zola well defined this illusion: “ We congratu- 
lated him,” said he, “ upon that health which 
seemed unbreakable, and justly credited him 
with the soundest constitution of our band, as 
well as with the clearest mind and the sanest 
reason. It was then that this frightful thunder- 
bolt destroyed him.” 

It is not exact to say that the lofty genius of 
De Maupassant was that of an absolutely sane 
man. We comprehend it to-day, and, on re- 
reading him, we find traces everywhere of his 
final malady. But it is exact to say that this 
wounded genius was, by a singular circum- 
stance, the genius of a robust man. A physi- 
ologist would without doubt explain this 
anomaly by the coexistence of a nervousJesfon, 
light at first, with a muscular, * athletic tem- 
perament. .Whatever theTcause, the effect is 
undeniable. The skilled and dainty pessimism 
of De Maupassant was accompanied by a vigor 
and physique very un-u^trair'-tlis sensations 
are in turn those of a hunter and of a sailor, 


IX 


De Maupassant 


who have, as the old French saying expres- 
sively puts it, “ swift foot, eagle eye,” and 
who are attuned to all the whisperings of 
nature. 

The author of Une Vie and the writer of 
Clara Jo%ul resemble each other in a singular 
and analogous circumstance. Both achieved 
renown at the first blow, and by a master- 
piece which they were able to equal but never 
surpass. Both were misanthropes early in 
life, and practised to the end the ancient 
advice that the disciple of Beyle carried upon 
his seal: fiefivrja-o cbnore iv, “Remember to dis- 
trust.” And, at the same time, both had deli- 
cate, tender hearts under this affectation of 
cynicism, both were excellent sons, irreproach- 
able friends, indulgent masters, and both were 
idolized by their inferiors. Both were worldly, 
yet still loved a wanderer’s life; both joined to 
a constant taste for luxury an irresistible de- 
sire for solitude. 

They are separated, however, by pro- 
found differences, which perhaps belong less 
to their nature than to that of the masters from 
whom they received their impulses: Stendhal, 
so alert, so mobile, after a youth passed in 
war and a ripe age spent in vagabond jour- 
x 


Critical Introduction 


neys, rich in experiences, immediate and per- 
sonal; Flaubert, so poor in direct impressions, 
so paralyzed by his health, by his family, by 
his theories even, and so rich in reflections, for 
the most part solitary. 

The theory of the mean of truth on one side, 
as the foundation of the subject, — “ the 
humble truth/' as he termed it at the begin- 
ning of Une Vie , — and of the agonizing for 
beauty on the other side, in composition, de- 
termines the whole use that Maupassant made 
of his literary gifts. It helped to make more 
intense and more systematic that dainty yet 
dangerous pessimism which in him was innate. 
The middle-class personage, in wearisome so- 
ciety like ours, is always a caricature, and the 
happenings are nearly always vulgar. When 
one studies a great number of them, one 
finishes by looking at humanity from the 
angle of disgust and despair. The philosophy 
of the romances and novels of De Maupassant 
is so continuously and profoundly surprising 
that one becomes overwhelmed by it. It 
reaches limitations; it seems to deny that man 
is susceptible to grandeur, or that motives 
of a superior order can uplift and ennoble the 
soul, but it does so with a sorrow that is pro- 
xi 


De Maupassant 


found. All that portion of the sentimental 
and moral world which in itself is the highest 
remains closed to it. 

In revenge, this philosophy finds itself in a 
relation cruelly exact with the half-civilization 
of our day. By that I mean the poorly edu- 
cated individual who has rubbed against 
knowledge enough to justify a certain egoism, 
but who is too poor in faculty to conceive an 
ideal, and whose native grossness is corrupted 
beyond redemption. Under his blouse, or 
under his coat — whether he calls himself 
Renardet, as does the foul assassin in Petite 
Roque , or Duroy, as does the sly hero of 
Bel- Ami, or Bretigny, as does the vile se- 
ducer of Mont Oriol, or Cesaire, the son of 
Old Amable in the novel of that name — this 
degraded type abounds in Maupassant's stories, 
evoked with a ferocity almost jovial where it 
meets the robustness of temperament which I 
have pointed out, a ferocity which gives them 
a reality more exact still because the half- 
civilized person is often impulsive and, in con- 
sequence, the physical easily predominates. 
There, as elsewhere, the degenerate is every- 
where a degenerate who gives the impression 
of being an ordinary man. 

xii 


Critical Introduction 


There are quantities of men of this stamp in 
large cities. No writer has felt and expressed 
this complex temperament with more justice 
than De Maupassant, and, as he was an in- 
finitely careful observer of milieu and land- 
scape and all that constitutes a precise middle 
distance, his novels can be considered an 
irrefutable record of the social classes which 
he studied at a certain time and along certain 
lines. The Norman peasant and the Provencal 
peasant, for example; also the small office- 
holder, the gentleman of the provinces, the 
country squire, the clubman of Paris, the jour- 
nalist of the boulevard, the doctor of the spa, 
the commercial artist, and, on the feminine 
side, the servant girl, the working girl, the 
demigrisette , the street girl, rich or poor, the 
gallant lady of the city and of the provinces, 
and the society woman — these are some of 
the figures that he has painted at many sit- 
tings, and whom he has used to such effect 
that the novels and romances in which they are 
painted have come to be history. Just as it is 
impossible to comprehend the Rome of the 
Caesars without the work of Petronius, so is 
it impossible fully to comprehend the France 
of i 850-’90 without these stories of Maupas- 


De Maupassant 


sant. They are no more the whole image of 
the country than the Satyricon was the whole 
image of Rome, but what their author has 
wished to paint, he has painted to the life and 
with a brush that is graphic in the extreme. 

If Maupassant had only painted, in general 
fashion, the characters and the phase of litera- 
ture mentioned, he would not be distinguished 
from other writers of the group called “ natu- 
ralists/’ His true glory is in the extraordinary 
superiority of his art. He did not invent it, 
and his method is not alien to that of Ma- 
dame Tiovary, but he knew how to give it a 
suppleness, a variety, and a freedom which 
were always wanting in Flaubert. The latter, 
in his best pages, is always strained. To use 
the expressive metaphor of the Greek athletes, 
he “ smells of the oil.” When one recalls 
that, when attacked by hysteric epilepsy, Flau- 
bert postponed the crisis of the terrible malady 
by means of sedatives, this strained atmos- 
phere of labor — I was going to say of stupor 
— which pervades his work is explained. He 
is an athlete, a runner, but one who drags at 
his feet a terrible weight. He is in the race 
only for the prize of effort, an effort of which 
every motion reveals the intensity. 

xiv 


Critical Introduction 


Maupassant, on the other hand, if he suf- 
fered from a nervous lesion, gave no sign of 
it, except in his heart. His intelligence was 
bright and lively, and above all his imagina- 
tion, served by senses always on the alert, 
preserved for some years an astonishing fresh- 
ness of direct vision. If his art was due to 
Flaubert, it is no more belittling to him than 
if one call Raphael an imitator of Perugini. 

Like Flaubert, he excelled in composing a 
story, in distributing the facts with subtle 
gradation, in bringing in at the end of a fa- 
miliar dialogue something startlingly dramatic, 
but such composition, with him, seems easy, 
and while the descriptions are marvelously 
well established in his stories, the reverse is 
true of Flaubert's, which always appear a 
little veneered. Maupassant’s phrasing, how- 
ever dramatic it may be, remains easy and 
flowing. 

Maupassant always sought for large and 
harmonious rhythm in his deliberate choice 
of terms, always chose sound, wholesome 
language, with a constant care for technical 
beauty. Inheriting from his master an instru- 
ment already forged, he wielded it with a 
surer skill. In the quality of his style, at once 
xv 


De Maupassant 


so firm and clear, so gorgeous yet so sober, 
so supple and so strong, he equals the writers 
of the seventeenth century. His method, so 
deeply and simply French, succeeds in giving 
an indescribable “tang” to his descriptions. If 
observation from nature imprints upon his 
tales the strong accent of reality, the prose in 
which they are shrined so conforms to the 
genius of the race as to smack of the soil. 

It is enough that the critics of to-day place 
Guy de Maupassant among our classic writers. 
He has his place in the ranks of pure French 
genius, with the Regniers, the La Fontaines, 
the Molieres. And those signs of secret ill 
divined everywhere under this wholesome 
prose surround it, for those who knew and 
loved him, with a pathos that is inexpressible. 



xvi 


CONTENTS 


The False Gems / 

i 

Simon’s Papa 

*5 

In the Moonlight 

dl 

The Old Maid 

53 

The Lancer’s Wife 

V 

The Sequel to a Divorce 

97 

The Englishman 

109 

Sentiment 

121 

The Fishermen 

131 

In His Sweetheart’s Livery 

M5 

Bertha 

155 

A Message of LoVe 

^73 

Discovery 

175 

To a Child/ 

179 

On the Death of Louis Bouilhet 

181 


xvii 



LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS 


FACING 

PAGE 


Henri Rene Albert Guy de Maupassant 

Frontispiece 


“ The man had his arm about his mis- 
tress’s neck ; from time to time 
. he kissed her” 51 

“ I brought wood and dried leaves to- 
gether to make her funeral pyre ” 94 


xix 


A HISTORY OF THE BINDING OF THIS 
VOLUME 


Facsimile of a Celebrated French Binding of the Six- 
teenth Century, Executed for Queen Catherine 
De Medici. 



>UEEN CATHERINE DE 
MEDICI in youth and in 
maturer years was a lover 
of the beautiful in art and 
?in literature. Her love for 
literature showed itself not 
only in the choice of her 
books but in the affectionate care she man- 
ifested in selecting and supervising the bind- 
ings placed upon them. Her artistic genius 
came to her by descent, and was celebrated 
in verse by no less a poet than Ronsard. 

This binding is a facsimile of the cover 
placed upon the works of Dionysius the Are- 
opagite by command of Queen Catherine in 
1 560. The Binder was Claude Picques, relieur 
to King Henri II. The original color was a 
seal-brown morocco, the sides being decorated 
xxi 


De Maupassant 


with a geometrical design outlined in gold and 
combined with arabesques. In the center of 
the first cover are the Arms of the Queen, 
ensigned with the royal crown, and surrounded 
by the Cordeliere, or girdle, indicative of 
widowhood. 

Queen Catherine's bindings are the work 
of the most skilful artists of her time, a fact 
which, added to her own superb taste and 
the care with which she supervised their work, 
makes these examples of bibliopegy much 
sought after and exceedingly rare. 



XXII 


THE FALSE GEMS 


LANTIN had met the young 
woman at a soiree, at the 
home of the assistant chief 
of his bureau, and at first 
sight had fallen madly in love 
with her. 

She was the daughter of a 
country physician who had died some months 
previously. She had come to live in Paris 
with her mother, who visited much among 
her acquaintances, in the hope of making a 
favorable marriage for her daughter. They 
were poor and honest, quiet and unaffected. 

The young girl was a perfect type of the 
virtuous woman whom every sensible young 
man dreams of one day winning for life. Her 
simple beauty had the charm of angelic mod- 
esty, and the imperceptible smile which con- 
stantly hovered about her lips seemed to be 
the reflection of a pure and lovely soul. Her 



De Maupassant 


praises resounded on every side. People were 
neve r ti red of say ing : ‘ * H appy the man who win s 
her love! He could not find a better wife/' 

Now M. Lantin enjoyed a snug little in- 
come of $700, and, thinking he could safely 
assume the responsibilities of matrimony, 
proposed to this model young girl and was 
accepted. 

He was unspeakably happy with her; she 
governed his household so cleverly and eco- 
nomically that they seemed to live in luxury. 
She lavished the most delicate attentions on 
her husband, coaxed and fondled him, and 
the charm of her presence was so great that 
six years after their marriage M. Lantin dis- 
covered that he loved his wife even more than 
during the first days of their honeymoon. 

He only felt inclined to blame her for two 
things: her love of the theater, and a taste for 
false jewelry. Her friends (she was ac- 
quainted with some officers’ wives) frequently 
procured for her a box at the theater, often 
for the first representations of the new plays; 
and her husband was obliged to accompany 
her, whether he willed or not, to these amuse- 
ments, though they bored him excessively 
after a day’s labor at the office. 

2 


The False Gems 


After a time, M. Lantin begged his wife to 
get some lady of her acquaintance to accom- 
pany her. She was at first opposed to such 
an arrangement; but, after much persuasion 
on his part, she finally consented — to the 
infinite delight of her husband. 

Now, with her love for the theater came also 
the desire to adorn her person. True, her 
costumes remained as before, simple, and in 
the most correct taste; but she soon began to 
ornament her ears with huge rhinestones 
which glittered and sparkled like real dia- 
monds. Around her neck she wore strings 
of false pearls, and on her arms bracelets of 
imitation gold. 

Her husband frequently remonstrated with 
her, saying: 

“ My dear, as you cannot afford to buy real 
diamonds, you ought to appear adorned with 
your beauty and modesty alone, which are the 
rarest ornaments of your sex.” 

But she would smile sweetly, and say: 

“ What can I do? I am so fond of jewelry. 
It is my only weakness. We cannot change 
our natures.” 

Then she would roll the pearl necklaces 
around her fingers, and hold up the bright 
3 


De Maupassant 


gems for her husband’s admiration, gently 
coaxing him: 

“ Look! are they not lovely? One would 
swear they were real.” 

M. Lantin would then answer, smilingly: 

“ You have Bohemian tastes, my dear.” 

Often of an evening, when they were en- 
joying a Ute-a-tete by the fireside, she would 
place on the tea-table the leather box contain- 
ing the “ trash,” as M. Lantin called it. She 
would examine the false gems with a passion- 
ate attention, as though they were in some way 
connected with a deep and secret joy; and she 
often insisted on passing a necklace around 
her husband’s neck, and laughing heartily 
would exclaim: “ How droll you look! ” Then 
she would throw herself into his arms and kiss 
him affectionately. 

One evening in winter she attended the 
opera, and on her return was chilled through 
and through. The next morning she coughed, 
and eight days later she died of inflammation 
of the lungs. 

M. Lantin’s despair was so great that his 
hair became white in one month. He wept 
unceasingly; his heart was torn with grief, 
and his mind was haunted by the remembrance 
4 


The False Gems 


of the smile, the voice — by every charm of his 
beautiful dead wife. 

Time, the healer, did not assuage his grief. 
Often during office hours, while his colleagues 
were discussing the topics of the day, his eyes 
would suddenly fill with tears, and he would 
give vent to his grief in heartrending sobs. 
Everything in his wife’s room remained as 
before her decease; and here he was wont to 
seclude himself daily and think of her who had 
been his treasure — the joy of his existence. 

But life soon became a struggle. His in- 
come, which in the hands of his wife had cov- 
ered all household expenses, was now no lon- 
ger sufficient for his own immediate wants; 
and he wondered how she could have managed 
to buy such excellent wines, and such rare 
delicacies, things which he could no longer 
procure with his modest resources. 

He incurred some debts and was soon re- 
duced to absolute poverty. One morning, 
finding himself without a cent in his pocket, 
he resolved to sell something, and, imme- 
diately, the thought occurred to him of dis- 
posing of his wife’s paste jewels. He cher- 
ished in his heart a sort of rancor against the 
false gems. They had always irritated him 
5 


De Maupassant 


in the past, and the very sight of them spoiled 
somewhat the memory of his lost darling. 

To the last days of her life she had con- 
tinued to make purchases, bringing home new 
gems almost every evening. He decided to 
sell the heavy necklace which she seemed to 
prefer, and which, he thought, ought to be 
worth about six or seven francs; for although 
paste it was, nevertheless, of very fine work- 
manship. 

He put it in his pocket and started out in 
search of a jeweler’s shop. He entered the 
first one he saw; feeling a little ashamed to 
expose his misery, and also to offer such a 
worthless article for sale. 

“ Sir,” said he to the merchant, “ I would 
like to know what this is worth.” 

The man took the necklace, examined it, 
called his clerk and made some remarks in an 
undertone; then he put the ornament back on 
the counter, and looked at it from a distance 
to judge of the effect. 

M. Lantin was annoyed by all this detail 
and was on the point of saying: “ Oh! I know 
well enough it is not worth anything,” when 
the jeweler said: “ Sir, that necklace is worth 
from twelve to fifteen thousand francs; but I 
6 


The False Gems 


could not buy it unless you tell me now whence 
it comes/' 

The widower opened his eyes wide and re- 
mained gaping, not comprehending the mer- 
chant’s meaning. Finally he stammered: 
“ You say — are you sure? ” The other re- 
plied dryly: ‘‘You can search elsewhere and 
see if anyone will offer you more. 1 consider 
it worth fifteen thousand at the most. Come 
back here if you cannot do better.” 

M. Lantin, beside himself with astonish- 
- ment, took up the necklace and left the store. 
He wished time for reflection. 

Once outside, he felt inclined to laugh, and 
said to himself: “ The fool! Had I only taken 
him at his word! That jeweler cannot dis- 
tinguish real diamonds from paste.” 

A few minutes after, he entered another 
store in the Rue de la Paix. As soon as the 
proprietor glanced at the necklace, he cried 
out: 

“Ah, parbleu! 1 know it well; it was 
bought here.” 

M. Lantin was disturbed, and asked: 

“ How much is it worth ? ” 

“ Well, I sold it for twenty thousand francs. 
I am willing to take it back for eighteen thou- 
7 


De Maupassant 


sand when you inform me, according to our 
legal formality, how it comes to be in your 
possession." 

This time M. Lantin was dumbfounded. He 
replied : 

“ But — but — examine it well. Until this 
moment I was under the impression that it 
was paste/' 

Said the jeweler: 

“ What is your name, sir ? ” 

“ Lantin. I am in the employ of the Min- 
ister of the Interior. I live at No. 16 Rue des 
Martyrs." 

The merchant looked through his books, 
found the entry, and said: '‘That necklace 
was sent to Mme. Lantin’s address, 16 Rue 
des Martyrs, July 20, 1876." 

The two men looked into each other's eyes 
— the widower speechless with astonishment, 
the jeweler scenting a thief. The latter broke 
the silence by saying: 

“ Will you leave this necklace here for 
twenty-four hours? I will give you a re- 
ceipt." 

“ Certainly," answered M. Lantin, hastily. 
Then, putting the ticket in his pocket, he left 
the store. 


8 


The False Gems 


He wandered aimlessly through the streets, 
his mind in a state of dreadful confusion. He 
tried to reason, to understand. His wife 
could not afford to purchase such a costly 
ornament. Certainly not. But, then, it must 
have been a present ! — a present ! — a pres- 
ent from whom? Why was it given her? 

He stopped and remained standing in the 
middle of the street. A horrible doubt en- 
tered his mind — she? Then all the other 
gems must have been presents, too! The 
earth seemed to tremble beneath him — the 
tree before him was falling — throwing up his 
arms, he fell to the ground, unconscious. He 
recovered his senses in a pharmacy into which 
the passers-by had taken him, and was then 
taken to his home. When he arrived he shut 
himself up in his room and wept until nightfall. 
Finally, overcome with fatigue, he threw him- 
self on the bed, where he passed an uneasy, 
restless night. 

The following morning he arose and pre- 
pared to go to the office. It was hard to work 
after such a shock. He sent a letter to his 
employer requesting to be excused. Then he 
remembered that he had to return to the 
jeweler’s. He did not like the idea; but he 
9 


De Maupassant 


could not leave the necklace with that man. 
So he dressed and went out. 

It was a lovely day; a clear blue sky smiled 
on the busy city below, and men of leisure 
were strolling about with their hands in their 
pockets. 

Observing them, M. Lantin said to himself: 
“ The rich, indeed, are happy. With money 
it is possible to forget even the deepest sor- 
row. One can go where one pleases, and in 
travel find that distraction which is the surest 
cure for grief. Oh! if I were only rich! ” 

He began to feel hungry, but his pocket was 
empty. He again remembered the necklace. 
Eighteen thousand francs! Eighteen thou- 
sand francs! What a sum! 

He soon arrived in the Rue de la Paix, 
opposite the jeweler’s. Eighteen thousand 
francs! Twenty times he resolved to go in, 
but shame kept him back. He was hungry, 
however, — very hungry, and had not a cent 
in his pocket. He decided quickly, ran across 
the street in order not to have time for re- 
flection, and entered the store. 

The proprietor immediately came forward, 
and politely offered him a chair; the clerks 
glanced at him knowingly. 

io 


The False Gems 


“ I have made inquiries, M. Lantin,” said 
the jeweler, “ and if you are still resolved to 
dispose of the gems, I am ready to pay you 
the price I offered.” 

“ Certainly, sir,” stammered M. Lantin. 

Whereupon the proprietor took from a 
drawer eighteen large bills, counted and 
handed them to M. Lantin, who signed a re- 
ceipt and with a trembling hand put the money 
into his pocket. 

As he was about to leave the store, he 
turned toward the merchant, who still wore 
the same knowing smile, and lowering his 
' eyes, said: 

“ I have — I have other gems which I have 
received from the same source. Will you buy 
them also? ” 

The merchant bowed: “Certainly, sir.” 

M. Lantin said gravely: “I will bring them to 
you.” An hour later he returned with the gems. 

The large diamond earrings were worth 
twenty thousand francs; the bracelets thirty- 
five thousand; the rings, sixteen thousand; a 
set of emeralds and sapphires, fourteen thou- 
sand; a gold chain with solitaire pendant, 
forty thousand — making the sum of one hun- 
dred and forty-three thousand francs. 

1 1 


De Maupassant 


The jeweler remarked, jokingly: 

“ There was a person who invested all her 
earnings in precious stones/' 

M. Lantin replied, seriously: 

“ It is only another way of investing one's 
money." 

That day he lunched at Voisin's and drank 
wine worth twenty francs a bottle. Then he 
hired a carriage and made a tour of the Bois, 
and as he scanned the various turnouts with 
a contemptuous air he could hardly refrain 
from crying out to the occupants: 

“ I, too, am rich! I am worth two hundred 
thousand francs." 

Suddenly he thought of his employer. He 
drove up to the office, and entered gaily, 
saying: 

“ Sir, I have come to resign my position. 
I have just inherited three hundred thousand 
francs." 

He shook hands with his former colleagues 
and confided to them some of his projects for 
the future; then he went off to dine at the 
Cafe Anglais. 

He seated himself beside a gentleman of 
aristocratic bearing, and during the meal in- 
formed the latter confidentially that he had 
12 


The False Gems 


just inherited a fortune of four hundred thou- 
sand francs. 

For the first time in his life he was not bored 
at the theater, and spent the remainder of the 
night in a gay frolic. 

Six months afterward he married again. 
His second wife was a very virtuous woman, 
with a violent temper. She caused him much 
sorrow. 



13 



SIMON’S PAPA 



?OON had just struck. The 
school-door opened and the 
youngsters streamed out 
tumbling over one another 
>in their haste to get out 
quickly. But instead of 
promptly dispersing and go- 
ing home to dinner, as was their daily wont, 
they stopped a few paces off, broke up into 
knots and set to whispering. 

The fact was that that morning Simon, the 
son of La Blanchotte, had, for the first time, 
attended school. 

They had all of them in their families heard 
of La Blanchotte; and although in public she 
was welcome enough, the mothers among 
themselves treated her with compassion of a 
somewhat disdainful kind, which the children 
had caught without in the least knowing why. 

As for Simon himself, they did not know 
15 


De Maupassant 


him, for he never went abroad, and did not 
play around with them through the streets of 
the village or along the banks of the river. 
So they loved him but little; and it was with 
a certain delight, mingled with astonishment, 
that they gathered in groups this morning, 
repeating to each other this sentence, con- 
cocted by a lad of fourteen or fifteen who ap- 
peared to know all about it, so sagaciously did 
he wink: “ You know Simon — well, he has 
no papa/' 

La Blanchotte’s son appeared in his turn 
upon the threshold of the school. 

He was seven or eight years old, rather 
pale, very neat, with a timid and almost awk- 
ward manner. 

He was making his way back to his mother’s 
house when the various groups of his school- 
fellows, perpetually whispering, and watching 
him with the mischievous and heartless eyes 
of children bent upon playing a nasty trick, 
gradually surrounded him and ended by in- 
closing him altogether. There he stood amid 
them, surprised and embarrassed, not under- 
standing what they were going to do with him. 
But the lad who had brought the news, puffed up 
with the success he had met with, demanded: 
16 


Simon’s Papa 


“ What do you call yourself? 77 
He answered: “ Simon / 7 
‘‘Simon what?” retorted the other. 

The child, altogether bewildered, repeated: 
“ Simon / 7 

The lad shouted at him: “ You must be 
named Simon something! That is not a name 
— Simon indeed ! 77 

And he, on the brink of tears, replied for 
the third time: 

“ I am named Simon . 77 
The urchins began laughing. The lad tri- 
umphantly lifted up his voice: “ You can see 
plainly that he has no papa / 7 
A deep silence ensued. The children were 
dumbfounded by this extraordinary, impos- 
sibly monstrous thing — a boy who had not 
a papa; they looked upon him as a phenome- 
non, an unnatural being, and they felt rising 
in them the hitherto inexplicable pity of their 
mothers for La Blanchotte. As for Simon, 
he had propped himself against a tree to avoid 
falling, and he stood there as if paralyzed by 
an irreparable disaster. He sought to ex- 
plain, but he could think of no answer 
for them, no way to deny this horrible 
charge that he had no papa. At last he 
17 


De Maupassant 


shouted at them quite recklessly : “ Yes, I 
have one.” 

“ Where is he? ” demanded the boy. 

Simon was silent, he did not know. The 
children shrieked, tremendously excited. These 
sons of toil, nearly related to animals, ex- 
perienced the cruel craving which makes the 
fowls of a farmyard destroy one of their own 
kind as soon as it is wounded. Simon sud- 
denly spied a little neighbor, the son of a 
widow, whom he had always seen, as he him- 
self was to be seen, quite alone with his 
mother. 

“ And no more have you,” he said, “ no 
more have you a papa.” 

“ Yes,” replied the other, “ I have one.” 

" Where is he?” rejoined Simon. 

“ He is dead,” declared the brat with superb 
dignity, “ he is in the cemetery, is my papa.” 

A murmur of approval rose amid the scape- 
graces, as if the fact of possessing a papa dead 
in a cemetery made their comrade big enough 
to crush the other one who had no papa at all. 
And these rogues, whose fathers were for the 
most part evildoers, drunkards, thieves, and 
ill-treaters of their wives, hustled each other 
as they pressed closer and closer to Simon, as 
18 


Simon’s Papa 


though they, the legitimate ones, would stifle 
in their pressure one who was beyond the 
law. 

The lad next Simon suddenly put his tongue 
out at him with a waggish air and shouted at 
him: 

“ No papa! No papa! ” 

Simon seized him by the hair with both 
hands and set to work to demolish his legs 
with kicks, while he bit his cheek ferociously. 
A tremendous struggle ensued between the 
two boys, and Simon found himself beaten, 
torn, bruised, rolled on the ground in the 
middle of the ring of applauding little vaga- 
bonds. As he arose, mechanically brushing 
his little blouse all covered with dust with his 
hand, some one shouted at him: 

“ Go and tell your papa.” 

He then felt a great sinking in his heart. 
They were stronger than he, they had beaten 
him and he had no answer to give them, for 
he knew it was true that he had no papa. 
Full of pride, he tried for some moments to 
struggle against the tears which were suffo- 
cating him. He had a choking fit, and then 
without cries he began to weep with great sobs 
which shook him incessantly. Then a fero- 
19 


De Maupassant 


cious joy broke out among his enemies, and, 
just like savages in fearful festivals, they took 
one another by the hand and danced in a 
circle about him as they repeated in refrain: 

“ No papa! No papa! ” 

But suddenly Simon ceased sobbing. Frenzy 
overtook him. There were stones under his 
feet; he picked them up and with all his 
strength hurled them at his tormentors. Two 
or three were struck and ran away yelling, 
and so formidable did he appear that the rest 
became panic-stricken. Cowards, like a jeer- 
ing crowd in the presence of an exasperated 
man, they broke up and fled. Left alone, the 
little thing without a father set off running 
toward the fields, for a recollection had been 
awakened which nerved his soul to a great 
determination. He made up his mind to 
drown himself in the river. 

He remembered, in fact, that eight days ago 
a poor devil who begged for his livelihood had 
thrown himself into the water because he had 
no more money. Simon had been there when 
they fished him out again; and the sight of the 
fellow, who had seemed to him so miserable 
and ugly, had then impressed him — his pale 
cheeks, his long drenched beard, and his open 
20 


Simon’s Papa 


eyes being full of calm. The bystanders had 
said: 

“ He is dead.” 

And some one had added: 

“ He is quite happy now.” 

So Simon wished to drown himself also be- 
cause he had no father, just as the wretched 
being did who had no money. 

He reached the water and watched it flow- 
ing. Some fishes were rising briskly in the 
clear stream and occasionally made little leaps 
and caught the flies on the surface. He 
stopped crying in order to watch them, for 
their feeding interested him vastly. But, at 
intervals, as in the lulls of a tempest, when 
tremendous gusts of wind snap off trees and 
then die away, this thought would return to 
him with intense pain: 

“ I am about to drown myself because I have 
no papa.” 

It was very warm and fine weather. The 
pleasant sunshine warmed the grass; the 
water shone like a mirror; and Simon enjoyed 
for some minutes the happiness of that lan- 
guor which follows weeping, desirous even of 
falling asleep there upon the grass in the 
warmth of noon. 


21 


De Maupassant 


A little green frog leaped from under his 
feet. He endeavored to catch it. It escaped him. 
He pursued it and lost it three times following. 
At last he caught it by one of its hind legs and 
began to laugh as he saw the efforts the creature 
made to escape. It gathered itself up on its 
large legs and then with a violent spring sud- 
denly stretched them out as stiff as two bars. 

Its eyes stared wide open in their round, 
golden circle, and it beat the air with its front 
limbs, using them as though they were hands. 
It reminded him of a toy made with straight 
slips of wood nailed zigzag one on the other, 
which by a similar movement regulated the 
exercise of the little soldiers fastened thereon. 
Then he thought of his home and of his mother, 
and overcome by great sorrow he again began 
to weep. His limbs trembled; and he placed 
himself on his knees and said his prayers as 
before going to bed. But he was unable to 
finish them, for such hurried and violent sobs 
overtook him that he was completely over- 
whelmed. He thought no more, he no longer 
heeded anything around him, but was wholly 
given up to tears. 

Suddenly a heavy hand was placed upon his 
shoulder, and a rough voice asked him: 

22 


Simon’s Papa 


“ What is it that causes you so much grief, 
my fine fellow? ” 

Simon turned round. A tall workman, with 
a black beard and hair all curled, was staring 
at him good-naturedly. He answered with 
his eyes and throat full of tears: 

“ They have beaten me because — I — I 
have no papa — no papa.” 

“What!” said the man, smiling, “why, 
everybody has one.” 

The child answered painfully amid his 
spasms of grief: 

“ But I — I — I have none.” 

Then the workman became serious. He had 
recognized La Blanchotte’s son, and although 
a recent arrival in the neighborhood he had a 
vague idea of her history. 

“ Well,” said he, “ console yourself, my boy, 
and come with me home to your mother. She 
will give you a papa.” 

And so they started on the way, the big 
one holding the little one by the hand. The 
man smiled afresh, for he was not sorry to 
see this Blanchotte, who by popular report 
was one of the prettiest girls in the coun- 
try-side — and, perhaps, he said to himself, 
at the bottom of his heart, a gay lass 
23 


De Maupassant 


who had erred once might very well err 
again. 

They arrived in front of a very neat little 
white house. 

“ There it is," exclaimed the child, and he 
cried: “ Mamma.” 

A woman appeared, and the workman in- 
stantly left off smiling, for he at once perceived 
that there was no more fooling to be done with 
the tall pale girl, who stood austerely at her 
door as though to defend from one man the 
threshold of that house where she had already 
been betrayed by another. Intimidated, his 
cap in his hand, he stammered out: 

“ See, Madame, I have brought you back 
your little boy, who had lost himself near the 
river.” 

But Simon flung his arms about his mother's 
neck and told her, as he again began to cry: 

“ No, mamma, I wished to drown myself, 
because the others had beaten me — had 
beaten me — because I have no papa.” 

A burning redness covered the young wom- 
an’s cheeks, and, hurt to the quick, she em- 
braced her child passionately, while the tears 
coursed down her face. The man, much 
moved, stood there, not knowing how to get 
24 


Simon’s Papa 


away. But Simon suddenly ran to him and 
said: 

“ Will you be my papa? " 

A deep silence ensued. La Blanchotte, 
dumb and tortured with shame, leaned against 
the wall, her hands upon her heart. The 
child, seeing that no answer was made him, 
replied: 

“ If you do not wish it, I shall return to 
drown myself/' 

The workman took the matter as a jest and 
answered laughing: 

“ Why, yes, I wish it, certainly." 

“ What is your name, then," went on the 
child, “ so that I may tell the others when 
they wish to know your name? " 

“Philip," answered the man. 

Simon was silent a moment so that he might 
get the name well into his memory; then he 
stretched out his arms, quite consoled, and 
said: 

“ Well, then, Philip, you are my papa." 

The workman, lifting him from the ground, 
kissed him hastily on both cheeks, and then 
strode away quickly. 

When the child returned to school next day 
he was received with a spiteful laugh, and at 

25 


De Maupassant 


the end of school, when the lads were on the 
point of recommencing, Simon threw these 
words at their heads as he would have cast 
a stone: " He is named Philip, my papa.” 

Yells of delight burst out from all sides. 

“ Philip who? Philip what ? What on earth 
is Philip? Where did you pick up your Philip?” 

Simon answered nothing; and immovable 
in faith he defied them with his eyes, ready to 
be martyred rather than fly before them. 
The schoolmaster came to his rescue and he 
returned home to his mother. 

For a space of three months, the tall work- 
man, Philip, frequently passed by La Blan- 
chette’ s house, and sometimes made bold to 
speak to her when he saw her sewing near the 
window. She answered him civilly, always 
sedately, never joking with him, nor permit- 
ting him to enter her house. Notwithstand- 
ing this, being, like all men, a bit of a coxcomb, 
he imagined that she was often rosier than 
usual when she chatted with him. 

But a fallen reputation is so difficult to 
recover, and always remains so fragile that, 
in spite of the shy reserve La Blanchotte 
maintained, they already gossiped in the 
neighborhood. 


26 


Simon’s Papa 


As for Simon, he loved his new papa much, 
and walked with him nearly every evening 
when the day’s work was done. He went 
regularly to school and mixed in a dignified 
way with his schoolfellows without ever an- 
swering them back. 

One day, however, the lad who had first 
attacked him said to him: 

“ You have lied. You have not a papa 
named Philip.” 

“ Why do you say that? ” demanded Simon, 
much disturbed. 

The youth rubbed his hands. He replied: 

“ Because if you had one he would be your 
mamma’s husband.” 

Simon was confused by the truth of this 
reasoning; nevertheless he retorted: 

“ He is my papa all the same.” 

“ That can very well be,” exclaimed the 
urchin with a sneer, “ but that is not being 
your papa altogether.” 

La Blanchotte’s little one bowed his head 
and went off dreaming in the direction of the 
forge belonging to old Loizon, where Philip 
worked. 

This forge was entombed in trees. It was 
very dark there, the red glare of a formidable 
27 


De Maupassant 


furnace alone lit up with great flashes five 
blacksmiths, who hammered upon their anvils 
with a terrible din. Standing enveloped in 
flame, they worked like demons, their eyes 
fixed on the red-hot iron they were pounding; 
and their dull ideas rising and falling with 
their hammers. 

Simon entered without being noticed and 
quietly plucked his friend by the sleeve. 
Philip turned round. All at once the work 
came to a standstill and the men looked on 
very attentively. Then, in the midst of this 
unaccustomed silence, rose the little slender 
pipe of Simon: 

“ Philip, explain to me what the lad at La 
Michande has just told me, that you are not 
altogether my papa .” 

“ And why that? ” asked the smith. 

The child replied in all innocence: 

“ Because you are not my mamma's hus- 
band." 

No one laughed. Philip remained stand- 
ing, leaning his forehead upon the back of his 
great hands, which held the handle of his 
hammer upright upon the anvil. He mused. 
His four companions watched him, and, like 
a tiny mite among these giants, Simon anx- 
28 


Simon’s Papa 


iously waited. Suddenly, one of the smiths, 
voicing the sentiment of all, said to Philip: 

“ All the same La Blanchotte is a good and 
honest girl, stalwart and steady in spite of 
her misfortune, and one who would make a 
worthy wife for an honest man.” 

“ That is true,” remarked the three others. 

The smith continued: 

“ Is it the girl’s fault if she has fallen? She 
had been promised marriage, and I know more 
than one who is much respected to-day and 
has sinned every bit as much.” 

“ That is true,” responded the three men 
in chorus. 

He resumed: 

“ How hard she has toiled, poor thing, to 
educate her lad all alone, and how much she 
has wept since she no longer goes out, save to 
church, God only knows.” 

“ That also is true,” said the others. 

Then no more was heard save the roar of 
the bellows which fanned the fire of the fur- 
nace. Philip hastily bent himself down to 
Simon : 

“ Go and tell your mamma that I shall come 
to speak to her.” 

Then he pushed the child out by the shoul- 
29 


De Maupassant 


ders. He returned to his work and in unison 
the five hammers again fell upon their anvils. 
Thus they wrought the iron until nightfall, 
strong, powerful, happy, like Vulcans satis- 
fied. But as the great bell of a cathedral 
resounds upon feast days above the jingling 
of the other bells, so Philip's hammer, domi- 
nating the noise of the others, clanged second 
after second with a deafening uproar. His 
eye on the fire, he plied his trade vigorously, 
erect amid the sparks. 

The sky was full of stars as he knocked at 
La Blanchotte's door. He had his Sunday 
blouse on, a fresh shirt, and his beard was 
trimmed. The young woman showed herself 
upon the threshold and said in a grieved tone: 

“ It is ill to come thus when night has fallen, 
Mr. Philip." 

He wished to answer, but stammered and 
stood confused before her. 

She resumed: 

“ And you understand quite well that it 
will not do that I should be talked about any 
more." 

Then he said all at once: 

“ What does that matter to me, if you will 
be my wife ! " 


30 


Simon’s Papa 


No voice replied to him, but he believed that 
he heard in the shadow of the room the sound 
of a body falling. He entered very quickly; 
and Simon, who had gone to his bed, distin- 
guished the sound of a kiss and some words 
that his mother said very softly. Then he 
suddenly found himself lifted up by the hands 
of his friend, who, holding him at the length 
of his herculean arms, exclaimed to him: 

“ You will tell your school-fellows that your 
papa is Philip Remy, the blacksmith, and that 
he will pull the ears of all who do you any 
harm.” 

On the morrow, when the school was full 
and lessons were about to begin, little Simon 
stood up quite pale with trembling lips: 

“ My papa,” said he in a clear voice, “ is 
Philip Remy, the blacksmith, and he has 
promised to box the ears of all who do me any 
harm.” 

This time no one laughed any longer, for 
he was very well known, was Philip Remy, 
the blacksmith, and he was a papa of whom 
anyone in the world would be proud. 


3i 



WAS IT A DREAM ? 


HAD loved her madly! 

“ Why does one love ? 
Why does one love ? How 
queer it is to see only one 
being in the world, to have 
only one thought in one's 
mind, only one desire in the 
heart, and only one name on the lips — a 
name which comes up continually, rising, like 
the water in a spring, from the depths of the 
soul to the lips, a name which one repeats over 
and over again, which one whispers ceaselessly, 
everywhere, like a prayer. 

“ I am going to tell you our story, for love 
only has one, which is always the same. I 
met her and loved her; that is all. And for a 
whole year I have lived on her tenderness, on 
her caresses, in her arms, in her dresses, on 
her words, so completely wrapped up, bound, 
and absorbed in everything which came from 
33 



De Maupassant 


her, that I no longer cared whether it was day 
or night, or whether I was dead or alive, on 
this old earth of ours. 

“ And then she died. How ? I do not 
know; I no longer know anything. But one 
evening she came home wet, for it was raining 
heavily, and the next day she coughed, and 
she coughed for about a week, and took to 
her bed. What happened I do not remember 
now, but doctors came, wrote, and went away. 
Medicines were brought, and some women 
made her drink them. Her hands were hot, 
her forehead was burning, and her eyes bright 
and sad. When I spoke to her, she answered 
me, but I do not remember what she said. I 
have forgotten everything, everything, every- 
thing! She died, and I very well remember 
her slight, feeble sigh. The nurse said: * Ah! ' 
and I understood, I understood! 

“ I knew nothing more, nothing. I saw a 
priest, who said: ‘Your mistress?’ and it 
seemed to me as if he were insulting her. 
As she was dead, nobody had the right to 
say that any longer, and I turned him out. 
Another came who was very kind and tender, 
and I shed tears when he spoke to me about 
her. 


34 


“ They consulted me about the funeral, but 
I do not remember anything that they said, 
though I recollect the coffin, and the sound 
of the hammer when they nailed her down in 
it. Oh! God, God! 

“ She was buried! Buried! She! In that 
hole! Some people came — female friends. 
I made my escape and ran away. I ran, and 
then walked through the streets, went home, 
and the next day started on a journey. 

“ Yesterday 1 returned to Paris, and when 
I saw my room again — our room, our bed, 
our furniture, everything that remains of 
the life of a human being after death — I 
was seized by such a violent attack of fresh 
grief, that I felt like opening the window 
and throwing myself out into the street. I 
could not remain any longer among these 
things, between those walls which had inclosed 
and sheltered her, which retained a thousand 
atoms of her, of her skin and of her breath 
in their imperceptible crevices. I took up 
my hat to make my escape, and just as 1 
reached the door, I passed the large glass in 
the hall, which she had put there so that she 
35 


De Maupassant 


might look at herself every day from head to 
foot as she went out, to see if her toilette 
looked well, and was correct and pretty, from 
her little boots to her bonnet. 

“ I stopped short in front of that looking- 
glass in which she had so often been reflected 
— so often, so often, that it must have re- 
tained her reflection. I was standing there, 
trembling, with my eyes fixed on the glass — 
on that flat, profound, empty glass — which 
had contained her entirely, and had possessed 
her as much as I, as my passionate looks had. 
I felt as if I loved that glass. I touched it; 
it was cold. Oh! the recollection! sorrowful 
mirror, burning mirror, horrible mirror, to 
make men suffer such torments! Happy is 
the man whose heart forgets everything that 
it has contained, everything that has passed 
before it, everything that has looked at itself 
in it, or has been reflected in its affection, in 
its love! How I suffer! 

“ I went out without knowing it, without 
wishing it, and toward the cemetery. I found 
her simple grave, a white marble cross, with 
these few words: 


“ ‘ She loved, was loved, and died.’ 

36 


Was it a Dream? 


“ She is there, below, decayed! How horri- 
ble ! I sobbed with my forehead on the ground 
and I stopped there for a long time, a long 
time. Then I saw that it was getting dark, 
and a strange, mad wish, the wish of a de- 
spairing lover, seized me. I wished to pass 
the night, the last night, in weeping on her 
grave. But I should be seen and driven out. 
How was I to manage? I was cunning, and 
got up and began to roam about in that city 
of the dead. I walked and walked. How 
small this city is, in comparison with the 
other, the city in which we live. And yet, 
how much more numerous the dead are than 
the living. We want high houses, wide streets 
and much room for the four generations who 
see the daylight at the same time, drink water 
from the spring, and wine from the vines, and 
eat bread from the plains. 

“ And for all the generations of the dead, 
for all that ladder of humanity that has de- 
scended to us here, there is scarcely anything, 
scarcely anything! The earth takes them 
back, and oblivion effaces them. Adieu! 

“ At the end of the cemetery, I suddenly 
perceived that I was in its oldest part, where 
those who had been dead a long time are 
37 


De Maupassant 


mingling with the soil, where the crosses them- 
selves are decayed, where possibly newcomers 
will be put to-morrow. It is full of untended 
roses, of strong and dark cypress-trees, a sad 
and beautiful garden, nourished on human 
flesh. 

“ I was alone, perfectly alone. So I crouched 
in a green tree and hid myself there completely 
amid the thick and somber branches. I waited, 
clinging to the stem, as a shipwrecked man 
clings to a plank. 

“ When it was quite dark, I left my refuge 
and began to walk softly, slowly, inaudibly, 
through that ground full of dead people. I 
wandered about for a long time, but could 
not find her tomb again. I went on with 
extended arms, knocking against the tombs 
with my hands, my feet, my knees, my chest, 
even with my head, without being able to find 
her. I groped about like a blind man finding 
his way; I felt the stones, the crosses, the iron 
railings, the metal wreaths, and the wreaths 
of faded flowers! I read the names with my 
fingers, by passing them over the letters. 
What a night! What a night! I could not 
find her again! 

“ There was no moon! What a night! I 

38 


Was it a Dream? 


was frightened, horribly frightened in these 
narrow paths, between two rows of graves. 
Graves! graves! graves! nothing but graves! 
On my right, on my left, in front of me, around 
me, everywhere there were graves! I sat 
down on one of them, for I could not walk any 
longer, my knees were so weak. I could hear 
my heart beat! And I heard something else 
as well. What ? A confused, nameless noise. 
Was the noise in my head, in the impenetrable 
night, or beneath the mysterious earth, the 
earth sown with human corpses ? I looked all 
around me, but I cannot say how long I re- 
mained there; I was paralyzed with terror, 
cold with fright, ready to shout out, ready to 
die. 

“ Suddenly, it seemed to me that the slab 
of marble on which I was sitting was moving. 
Certainly it was moving, as if it were being 
raised. With a bound, I sprang upon the 
neighboring tomb, and I saw, yes, I distinctly 
saw the stone which I had just quitted rise 
upright. Then the dead person appeared, a 
naked skeleton, pushing the stone back with 
its bent back. I saw it quite clearly, although 
the night was so dark. On the cross I could 
read: 


39 


De Maupassant 


“‘Here lies Jacques Olivant, who died at the age of 
fifty-one. He loved his family, was kind and honorable, 
and died in the grace of the Lord.’ 

“ The dead man also read what was in- 
scribed on his tombstone; then he picked up 
a stone off the path, a little, pointed stone, 
and began to scrape the letters carefully. He 
slowly effaced them, and with the hollows of 
his eyes he looked at the places where they 
had been engraved. Then, with the tip of the 
bone that had been his forefinger, he wrote in 
luminous letters, like those lines which boys 
trace on walls with the tip of a lucifer match: 

“ ‘ Here reposes Jacques Olivant, who died at the age of 
fifty-one. He hastened his father’s death by his unkind- 
ness, as he wished to inherit his fortune; he tortured his 
wife, tormented his children, deceived his neighbors, robbed 
everyone he could, and died wretched.’ 

“ When he had finished writing, the dead 
man stood motionless, looking at his work. 
On turning round I saw that all the graves 
were open, that all the dead bodies had 
emerged from them, and that all had effaced 
the lies inscribed on the gravestones by their 
relations, substituting the truth instead. And 
I saw that all had been the tormentors of 
their neighbors — malicious, dishonest, hypo- 

40 


Was it a Dream? 


crites, liars, rogues,calumniators, envious; that 
they had stolen, deceived, performed every 
disgraceful, every abominable action, these good 
fathers, these faithful wives, these devoted sons, 
these chaste daughters, these honest trades- 
men, these men and women who were called 
irreproachable. They were all writing at the 
same time, on the threshold of their eternal 
abode, the truth, the terrible and the holy 
truth of which everybody was ignorant, or pre- 
tended to be ignorant, while they were alive. 

“ 1 thought that she also must have written 
something on her tombstone, and now running 
without any fear among the half-open coffins, 
among the corpses and skeletons, I went 
toward her, sure that I should find her im- 
mediately. 1 recognized her at once, without 
seeing her face, which was covered by the 
winding-sheet, and on the marble cross, where 
shortly before I had read: 

“ * She loved, was loved, and died.’ 

I now saw: 

“ * Having gone out in the rain one day, in order to 
deceive her lover, she caught cold and died.’ 

******* 

“ It appears that they found me at day- 
break, lying on the grave uncon scions/' 

4i 


» 


IN THE MOONLIGHT 


ELL-MERITEDwas the name, 
“ soldier of God/' by the 
Abbe Marignan. He was a 
tall, thin priest, fanatical to 
a degree, but just, and of an 
exalted soul. All his beliefs 
were fixed, with never a 
waver. He thought that he understood God 
thoroughly, that he penetrated His designs, 
His wishes. His intentions. 

Striding up and down the garden walk of 
hisdittle country parsonage, sometimes a ques- 
tion rose in his mind: “Why did God make 
that?" Then in his thoughts, putting him- 
self in God’s place, he searched obstinately, 
and nearly always was satisfied that he found 
the reason. He was not the man to murmur 
in transports of pious humility, “ O Lord, 
thy ways are past finding out!" What he 
said was: “ I am the servant of God; 1 ought 
43 



De Maupassant 


to know the reason of what he does, or to 
divine it if I do not.” 

Everything in nature seemed to him created 
with an absolute and admirable logic. The 
“ wherefore ” and the “ because ” were always 
balanced. The dawns were made to rejoice 
you on waking, the days to ripen the harvests, 
the rains to water them, the evenings to pre- 
pare for sleeping, and the nights dark for 
sleep. 

The four seasons corresponded perfectly to 
all the needs of agriculture; and to him the 
suspicion could never have come that nature 
has no intention, and that all which lives has 
accustomed itself, on the contrary, to the hard 
conditions of different periods, of climates, 
and of matter. 

But he hated women; he hated them un- 
consciously, and despised them by instinct. 
He often repeated the words of Christ, “ Wo- 
man, what have I to do with thee ? ” and he 
would add, “ One would almost say that God 
himself was ill pleased with that particular 
work of his hands.” Woman for him was 
indeed the “ child twelve times unclean ” of 
whom the poet speaks. She was the temptress 
who had ensnared the first man, and who still 
44 


In the Moonlight 


continued her damnable work; she was the 
being who is feeble, dangerous, mysteriously 
troublous. And even more than her poison- 
ous beauty, he hated her loving soul. 

He had often felt women's tenderness at- 
tack him, and though he knew himself to be 
unassailable, he grew exasperated at this need 
of loving which quivers continually in their 
hearts. 

To his mind, God had only created woman 
to tempt man and to test him. Man should 
not approach her without those precautions 
for defense which he would take, and the fears 
he would cherish, near an ambush. Woman, 
indeed, was just like a trap, with her arms 
extended and her lips open toward man. 

He had toleration only for nuns, rendered 
harmless by their vow; but he treated them 
harshly notwithstanding, because, ever at the 
bottom of their chained-up hearts, their chas- 
tened hearts, he perceived the eternal tender- 
ness that constantly went out even to him, 
although he was a priest. 

He had a niece who lived with her mother 
in a little house near by. He was bent on 
making her a sister of charity. She was pretty 
and hare-brained, and a great tease. When 
45 


) 


De Maupassant 


the abbe sermonized, she laughed; when he 
was angry at her, she kissed him vehemently, 
pressing him to her heart, while he would 
seek involuntarily to free himself from her 
embrace. Notwithstanding, it made him taste 
a certain sweet joy, awaking deep within him 
that sensation of fatherhood which slumbers 
in every man. 

Often he talked to her of God, of his God, 
walking beside her along the footpaths through 
the fields. She hardly listened, but looked 
at the sky, the grass, the flowers, with a joy 
of living which could be seen in her eyes. 
Sometimes she rushed forward to catch some 
flying creature, and bringing it back would 
cry: “ Look, my uncle, how pretty it is; I 
should like to kiss it.” And this necessity 
to “ kiss flies ” or sweet flowers worried, irri- 
tated, and revolted the priest, who saw, even 
in that, the ineradicable tenderness which ever 
springs in the hearts of women. 

One day the sacristan’s wife, who kept house 
for the Abbe Marignan, told him, very cau- 
tiously, that his niece had a lover! 

He experienced a dreadful emotion, and he 
stood choking, with the soap all over his face, 
in the act of shaving. 

46 


In the Moonlight 


When he found himself able to think and 
speak once more, he cried: “It is not true; 
you are lying, Melanie !” 

But the peasant woman put her hand on 
her heart: “ May our Lord judge me if I am 
lying, Monsieur le Cure. I tell you she goes 
to him every evening as soon as your sister 
is in bed. They meet each other beside the 
river. You have only to go there between 
ten o’clock and midnight, and see for yourself.” 

He ceased scratching his chin and com- 
menced to pace the room quickly, as he always 
did in his hours of gravest thought. When 
he tried to begin his shaving again, he cut 
himself three times from nose to ear. 

All day long he remained silent, swollen 
with anger and with rage. To his priestly 
zeal against the mighty power of love was 
added the moral indignation of a father, of a 
teacher, of a keeper of souls, who has been 
deceived, robbed, played with by a child. He 
felt the egotistical sorrow that parents feel 
when their daughter announces that she has 
chosen a husband without them and in spite 
of their advice. 

After his dinner, he tried to read a little, 
but he could not attune himself to it; and he 
47 


De Maupassant 


grew angrier and angrier. When it struck 
ten, he took his cane, a formidable oaken club 
which he always carried when he had to go 
out at night to visit the sick. Smilingly he 
regarded the enormous cudgel, holding it in 
his solid, countryman’s fist and cutting threat- 
ening circles with it in the air. Then, sud- 
denly, he raised it, and grinding his teeth, he 
brought it down upon a chair, the back of 
which, split in two, fell heavily to the ground. 

He opened his door to go out; but he stopped 
upon the threshold, surprised by such a splen- 
dor of moonlight as you seldom see. 

Endowed as he was with an exalted spirit, 
such a spirit as must have belonged to those 
dreamer-poets, the Fathers of the Church, he 
felt himself suddenly softened and moved by 
the grand and serene beauty of the pale-faced 
night. 

In his little garden, bathed in the soft bril- 
liance, his fruit-trees, all a-row, were outlining 
in shadow upon the walk their slender limbs 
of wood scarce clothed with green; while the 
giant honeysuckle climbing on the house wall 
exhaled delicious, sugared breaths, which hov- 
ered through the warm, clear night like a 
perfumed soul. 


48 


In the Moonlight 


He began to breathe deep, drinking the air 
as drunkards drink their wine, and walking 
slowly, ravished, surprised, and almost ob- 
livious of his niece. 

As he stepped into the open country he 
stopped to contemplate the whole plain, inun- 
dated by this caressing radiance, and drowned 
in the tender and languishing charm of the 
serene night. In chorus the frogs threw into 
space their short, metallic notes, and with the 
seduction of the moonlight, distant nightin- 
gales mingled that fitful music of theirs which 
brings no thoughts but dreams, a light and 
vibrant melody which seems attuned to kisses. 

The abbe continued his walk, his courage 
failing, he knew not why. He felt, as it were, 
enfeebled, and suddenly exhausted; he had 
a great desire to sit down, to pause right there 
and praise God in all His works. 

Below him, following the bends of the little 
river, wound a great line of poplars. On and 
about the banks, wrapping all the tortuous 
watercourse in a kind of light, transparent 
wadding, hung suspended a fine mist, a white 
vapor, which the moon-rays crossed, and sil- 
vered, and caused to gleam. 

The priest paused yet again, penetrated to 
49 


De Maupassant 


the depths of his soul by a strong and growing 
emotion. And a doubt, a vague uneasiness, 
seized on him; he felt that one of those ques- 
tions he sometimes put to himself was now 
being born. 

Why had God done this? Since the night 
is destined for sleep, for unconsciousness, for 
repose, for forgetfulness of everything, why, 
then, make it more charming than the day, 
sweeter than dawns and sunsets? And this 
slow, seductive star, more poetical than the 
sun, and so discreet that it seems designed to 
light up things too delicate, too mysterious, 
for the great luminary, — why had it come 
to brighten all the shades? Why did not the 
sweetest of all songsters go to rest like the 
others? Why set himself to singing in the 
vaguely troubling dark? Why this half-veil 
over the world? Why these quiverings of the 
heart, this emotion of the soul, this languor 
of the body? Why this display of seductions 
which mankind never sees, since night brings 
sleep ? For whom was this sublime spectacle 
intended, this flood of poetry poured from 
heaven to earth? The abbe did not under- 
stand it at all. 

But then, down there along the edge of the 
50 




V. 



♦ 



In the Moonlight 


pasture, appeared two shadows walking side 
by side under the arched roof of the trees all 
soaked in glittering mist. 

The man was the taller, and had his arm 
about his mistress's neck; from time to time 
he kissed her on the forehead. They ani- 
mated the lifeless landscape which enveloped 
them, a divine frame made, as it were, ex- 
pressly for them. They seemed, these two, 
a single being, the being for whom this calm 
and silent night was destined; and they ap- 
proached the priest like a living answer, the 
answer vouchsafed by his Master to his ques- 
tion. 

He stood stock-still, overwhelmed, and with 
a beating heart. He likened it to some Bible 
story, such as the loves of Ruth and Boaz, 
the accomplishment of the will of the Lord in 
one of those great scenes talked of in holy 
writ. Through his head ran the ver sides of 
the Song of Songs, the ardent cries, the calls 
of the body, all the passionate poetry of that 
poem which burns with tenderness and love. 
And he said to himself, “ God perhaps has 
made such nights as this to clothe with his 
ideals the loves of men." 

He withdrew before the couple, who went 
5 * 


De Maupassant 


on arm in arm. It was really his niece; and 
now he asked himself if he had not been about 
to disobey God. For does not God indeed 
permit love, since He surrounds it visibly with 
splendor such as this? 

And he fled, in amaze, almost ashamed, as 
if he had penetrated into a temple where he 
had no right to enter. 



52 


THE OLD MAID 


OUNT EUSTACHE D'ETCH- 
EGORRY’S solitary coun- 
try house had the appear- 
ance of a poor man's home, 
where people do not have 
enough to eat every day in 
the week, where the bottles 
are more frequently filled at the pump than 
in the cellar, and where they wait until it is 
quite dark before lighting the candles. 

It was an old and miserable building; the 
walls were crumbling to pieces, the grated iron 
gates were eaten away by rust, the holes in 
the broken windows had been mended with 
old newspapers, but the ancestral portraits 
which hung against the walls showed that it 
was no tiller of the soil, nor miserable back- 
bent laborer whose strength had gradually 
worn out, that lived there. Great, knotty 
elm-trees sheltered it, as with a tall, green 
53 



De Maupassant 


screen, and a large garden, full of wild rose- 
trees, of straggling plants, and of sickly look- 
ing vegetables, which sprang up half withered 
from the sandy soil, stretched down to the 
bank of the river. 

From the house, one could hear the monoto- 
nous sound of the water, which at one time 
rushed yellow and impetuous toward the sea, 
and then again flowed back, as if driven by 
some invisible force, toward the town, which 
could be seen in the distance, with its pointed 
spires, its ramparts, its ships at anchor by 
the side of the quay, and its citadel built on 
the top of a hill. 

A strong smell of the sea came from the 
offing, mingled with the smell of pine logs, and 
of the large nets with great pieces of seaweed 
clinging to them, which were drying in the 
sun. 

Why had Monsieur d’Etchegorry, who did 
not like the country, who was of a sociable 
rather than of a solitary nature, for he never 
walked alone, but associated with the retired 
officers who lived there, and frequently played 
game after game of piquet at the cafe, when 
he was in town — why had he buried himself 
in such a solitary place, by the side of a dusty 
54 


The Old Maid 


road at Boucau, a village close to the town, 
where on Sundays the soldiers took off their 
tunics, and sat in their shirt-sleeves in the 
public-houses, drinking the thin wine of the 
country, and teasing the girls? 

What secret reason he had for selling the 
mansion which he had possessed at Bayonne, 
close to the bishop's palace, and condemning 
his daughter, a girl of nineteen, to such a dull, 
listless, solitary life, counting the minutes far 
from everybody, as if she had been a nun, no 
one knew. Most people said that he had lost 
immense sums in gambling, and had wasted 
his fortune and ruined his credit in doubtful 
speculations. They wondered whether he still 
regretted the tender, sweet woman whom he 
had lost, who died one evening, after years of 
suffering, like a church lamp whose oil has 
been consumed to the last drop. Was he 
seeking for perfect oblivion, for that Nirvana 
in nature, in which a man becomes enervated 
and enveloped as with a moist, warm cloth? 
How could he be satisfied with such an exist- 
ence — with the bad cooking, and the careless, 
untidy ways of a charwoman, and with the 
shabby clothes, discolored by use, that he had 
to wear? 


55 


De Maupassant 


His numerous relations had been anxious 
about it at first, had tried to cure him of his 
apparent hypochondria, and to persuade him 
to do something. But as he was obstinate, 
avoided them, rejected their friendly offers 
with arrogance and self-sufficiency, even his 
brothers had abandoned and almost renounced 
him. All their affection had been transferred 
to the poor child who shared his solitude, and 
endured all her wretchedness with the resig- 
nation of a saint. Thanks to them, she had a 
few gleams of pleasure in her exile, was not 
dressed like a beggar girl, but received invita- 
tions, and appeared here and there at some 
ball, concert, or tennis party. The girl was 
extremely grateful to them for it all, although 
she would much have preferred that nobody 
should have held out a helping hand to her, 
but have left her to her dull life, without any 
day dreams or homesickness, so that she 
might grow used to her lot, and day by day 
lose all that remained to her of her pride of 
race and of her youth. 

With her sensitive and proud mind, she felt 
that she was not treated exactly as others 
were in society, that people showed her either 
too much pity or too much indifference, that 
5 6 


they knew all about her home life of unde- 
served poverty, and that in the folds of her 
muslin dress they could smell the mustiness 
of her dwelling. If she was animated, or 
buoyed up with secret hopes in her heart, if 
there was a smile on her lips, and light in her 
eyes when she went out at the gate, and the 
horses carried her off to town at a rapid trot, 
she was all the more low-spirited and tearful 
when she returned home. She used to shut 
herself up in her room and find fault with her 
destiny, declaring to herself that she would 
imitate her father, show relatives and friends 
politely out, with a passive and resigned ges- 
ture, and make herself so unpleasant and em- 
barrassing that they would grow tired of it 
in the end, would leave long intervals between 
their visits, and finally would not come to see 
her at all, but would turn away from her, as 
from some hospital where incurable patients 
were dying. 

Nevertheless, the older the count grew, the 
more the supplies in the small country house 
diminished, and the more painful and harder 
existence became. If a morsel of bread was 
left uneaten on the table, if an unexpected 
dish was served up at table, if she put a 
51 


De Maupassant 


piece of ribbon into her hair, he used to heap 
violent, spiteful reproaches on her, torrents 
of rage and vituperation and violent threats, 
like those of a madman who is tormented by 
some fixed idea. Monsieur d’Etchegorry had 
dismissed the servant and engaged a char- 
woman, whom he intended to pay merely by 
small sums on account, and he used to go to 
market with a basket on his arm. 

He locked up every morsel of food, used to 
count the lumps of sugar and charcoal, and 
bolted himself in all day long in a room that 
was larger than the rest, which for a long time 
had served as a drawing-room. At times he 
would be rather more gentle, as if he were 
troubled by vague thoughts, and used to say 
to his daughter, in an agonized voice, and 
trembling all over: “ You will never ask me 
for any accounts, will you? You will never 
demand your mother’s fortune? ” 

She always gave him the required promise, 
did not worry him with any questions, nor 
give vent to any complaints, and, thinking of 
her cousins, who would have good dowries, 
were growing up happily and peacefully amid 
careful and affectionate surroundings and beau- 
tiful old furniture, and were certain to be 

58 


The Old Maid 


loved and to be married some day, she asked 
herself why fate was so cruel to some and so 
kind to others, and what she had done to de- 
serve such disfavor. 

Marie-des-Anges d’Etchegorry, without be- 
ing absolutely pretty, possessed all the 
charm of her age, and everybody liked her. 
She was as tall and slim as a lily, with beau- 
tiful, fine, soft, fair hair and eyes of a dark, 
undecided color, which reminded one of those 
springs in the depths of the forests in which 
a ray of the sun is but rarely reflected — mir- 
rors which changed now to violet, then to the 
color of leaves, but most frequently were of 
a velvety blackness. Her whole being ex- 
haled the freshness of childhood, and an air 
that could not be described, but which was 
pleasant, wholesome, and frank. 

She lived on through the years, growing up 
faithful to the man who might have given her 
his name, honorable, having resisted temp- 
tations and snares, worthy of the motto which 
used to be engraved on the tombs of Roman 
matrons before the Caesars: “ She spun wool, 
and stayed at home.” 

When she was just twenty-one, Marie-des- 
Anges fell in love, and her beautiful, dark, 
59 


De Maupassant 


restless eyes for the first time became illu- 
minated with a look of dreamy happiness. 
For some one seemed to have noticed her; he 
waltzed with her more frequently than he did 
with the other girls, spoke to her in a low 
voice, dangled at her petticoats, and discom- 
posed her so much that she flushed deeply 
as soon as she heard the sound of his voice. 

His name was Andre de Gedre; he had just 
returned from Senegal, where, after several 
months of daily fighting in the desert, he had 
won his sub-lieutenant’s epaulets. 

With his thin, sunburnt, yellow face, looking 
awkward in his tight coat, in which his broad 
shoulders could not expand themselves com- 
fortably, and in which his arms, accustomed 
to cut right and left, were cramped in tight 
sleeves, he looked like one of those pirates of 
old, who used to scour the seas, pillaging, 
killing, hanging their prisoners to the yard- 
arms, and ready to engage a whole fleet, and 
who returned to port laden with booty, and 
occasionally with waifs and strays picked up 
at sea. 

He belonged to a race of buccaneers or of 
heroes, according to the breeze which swelled 
his sails and carried him north or south. 
60 


The Old Maid 


Over head and ears in debt, reduced to dis- 
counting doubtful legacies, to gambling at 
casinos, and to mortgaging the few acres of 
land that he still owned at much below their 
value, he nevertheless managed to make a 
pretty good figure in his hand-to-mouth ex- 
istence. He never gave in, never showed the 
blows that he had received, and waited for 
the last struggle in a state of blissful inac- 
tivity, while he sought for renewed strength 
and philosophy from the caressing lips of 
women. 

Marie-des-Anges seemed to him to be a toy 
which he could play with as he liked. She 
had the flavor of unripe fruit; left to herself, 
and sentimental as she was, she would only 
offer a very brief resistance to his attacks, 
would soon yield to his will, and when he was 
tired of her and threw her off, she would bow 
to the inevitable and would not worry him 
with violent scenes, or stand in his way with 
threats on her lips. And so he was kind, 
and used to wheedle her, and by degrees en- 
veloped her in the meshes of a net which 
continually hemmed her in closer and closer. 
He gained entire possession of her heart and 
confidence, without expressing any wish or 
6i 


De Maupassant 


making any promises, and managed so to 
establish his influence over her, that she did 
nothing but what he wished. 

Long before Monsieur de Gedre had ad- 
dressed any passionate words to her, or any 
of those avowals which immediately introduce 
warmth and danger into a flirtation, Marie- 
des-Anges had betrayed herself with the can- 
dor of a little girl, who does not think she is 
doing any wrong, and cannot hide what she 
thinks, what she is dreaming about, and the 
tenderness which lies hidden at the bottom 
of her heart. She no longer felt that horror 
of life which had formerly tortured her. She 
no longer felt herself alone, as she had felt 
formerly — so alone, so lost, even among her 
own people, that everything had become in- 
different to her. 

It was very pleasant and soothing to love 
and to think that she was loved, to have a 
furtive and secret understanding with another 
heart, to imagine that he was thinking of her 
at the same time that she was thinking of 
him, to shelter herself timidly under his pro- 
tection, to feel more unhappy each time she 
left him, and to experience greater happiness 
every time they met. 

62 


The Old Maid 


She wrote him long letters, which she did 
not venture to send him when they were 
written, for she was timid and feared that he 
would make fun of them. But she sang the 
whole day through like a lark that is intoxi- 
cated with the sun, so that Monsieur d'Etche- 
gorry scarcely recognized her any longer. 

Soon they made appointments together in 
some secluded spot, meeting for a few minutes 
in the aisles of the cathedral and behind the 
ramparts, or on the promenade of the Allees 
Marines, which was always dark, on account 
of the dense foliage. 

And at last, one evening in June, when the 
sky was so studded with stars that it might 
have been taken for the triumphal route of 
some sovereign, strewn with precious stones 
and rare flowers, Monsieur de Gedre went into 
the large neglected garden. 

Marie-des-Anges was waiting for him in a 
somber walk, with witch-elms on either side, 
listening for the least noise, looking at the 
closed windows of the house, and nearly faint- 
ing, as much from fear as from happiness. 
They spoke in a low voice. She was close to 
him; he must have heard the beating of her 
heart, into which he had cast the first seeds 
63 




De Maupassant 


of love, and he put his arms round her and 
clasped her gently, as if she had been some 
little bird that he was afraid of hurting, but 
which he did not wish to escape. 

She no longer knew what she was doing, 
but was in a state of entire, intense, supreme 
happiness. She shivered, and yet something 
burning seemed to permeate her whole being 
under her skin, from the nape of her neck to 
her feet, like a stream of flaming spirit. She 
would not have had the strength to disengage 
herself, or to take a step forward, so she 
leaned her head instinctively and very ten- 
derly against Andre's shoulder. He kissed 
her hair, touched her forehead with his lips, 
and at last put them against hers. The girl felt 
as if she were going to die and remained inert 
and motionless, with her eyes full of tears. 

He came nearly every evening for two 
months. She had not the courage to repel 
him or to speak to him seriously of the future, 
and could not understand why he had not 
yet asked her father for her hand, and had 
not fulfilled his former promises, until one 
Sunday, as she was coming from High Mass, 
walking on before her cousins, Marie-des- 
Anges heard the following words, from a 
64 


The Old Maid 


group in which Andre was standing. He was 
the speaker: 

“Oh! no,” he said, “you are altogether 
mistaken; I should never do anything so fool- 
ish. One does not marry a girl without a 
half-penny — one takes her for one's mistress.” 

The unhappy girl mastered her feelings, 
went down the steps of the porch quite steadily 
but feeling utterly crushed, as if by the news 
of some terrible disaster, and joined the ser- 
vant, who was waiting for her, to accompany 
her back to Boucau. The effect of what she 
had heard was to give her a serious illness, 
and for some time she hovered between life 
and death, consumed and wasted by a violent 
fever. When, after a fortnight's suffering, 
she grew convalescent, and looked at herself 
in the glass, she recoiled, as if she had been 
face to face with an apparition, for there was 
nothing left of her former self. 

Her eyes were dull, her cheeks pale and 
hollow, and there were white streaks in her 
silky, light hair. Why had she not succumbed 
to her illness? Why had destiny reserved 
her for such a trial, and increased the unhap- 
piness of her lot with disappointed hopes? 
But when that rebellious feeling was over, 

65 


De Maupassant 


she accepted her cross, fell into a state of 
ardent devotion, became crystallized in the 
torpor of old- womanhood, tried with all her 
might to rid her memory of any recollections 
that had become incrusted in it, and to put 
a thick black veil between herself and the past. 

She never walked in the garden now, never 
went to Bayonne, and would have liked to 
have choked and beaten herself when, in spite 
of her efforts and of her will, she remembered 
her lost happiness, and when some sensual 
feeling and a longing for past pleasures agi- 
tated her body afresh. 

That lasted for four years, which finished 
and altogether destroyed her good looks. She 
had gained the figure and the appearance of 
an old maid, when her father suddenly died, 
just as he was going to sit down to dinner. 
When the lawyer, who was summoned im- 
mediately, had ransacked the cupboards and 
drawers, he discovered a mass of securities, 
of banknotes, and of gold, which Count d’Etch- 
egorry, who was eaten up with avarice, had 
amassed eagerly and hidden away. It was 
found that Mademoiselle Marie-des-Anges, 
who was his sole heiress, possessed an income 
of fifty thousand francs. 

66 


The Old Maid 


She received the news without any emotion, 
for of what use was such a fortune to her now, 
and what should she do with it? Her eyes, 
alas! had been too much opened by all the 
tears that had fallen from them for her to 
delude herself with visionary hopes, and her 
heart had been too cruelly wounded to warm 
itself by lying illusions. She was seized by 
melancholy when she thought that in future 
she would be coveted, she who had been kept 
at arm’s length as if she had been a leper; 
that men would come after her money with 
odious impatience; that now that she was 
worn out and ugly, tired of everything and 
everybody, she would most certainly have 
plenty of suitors to refuse, and that perhaps 
he would come back to her, attracted by that 
amount of money, like a hawk hovering over 
its prey, — would try to rekindle the dead 
cinders, to revive some spark in them, and 
to obtain pardon for his cowardice. 

Oh! with what bitter pleasure she could 
have thrown those thousands into the road 
to ragged beggars, or scattered them about 
like manna to all who were suffering and 
dying of hunger, and who had neither roof 
nor hearth! She naturally soon became the 
67 


De Maupassant 


target at which everyone aimed, the goal for 
which all those who had formerly disdained 
her most now eagerly tried. 

It was not long before Monsieur de Gedre 
was in the ranks of her suitors, as she had 
foreseen, and caused her that last heart-burn- 
ing of seeing him humbled, kneeling at her 
feet, acting a comedy, trying every means to 
overcome her resistance, and to regain pos- 
session of that heart, now closed against him, 
after having been entirely his, in all its adora- 
ble virginity. 

And Marie-des-Anges had loved him so 
deeply that his letters, in which he recalled 
the past, and stirred up all the recollections 
of their love, their kisses, and their dreams, 
softened her in spite of herself, and came 
across her profound, incurable sadness, like 
a passing light, the reflection of a bonfire, 
which, from a distance, illumes a prison cell 
for a moment. 

He was poor himself, and had not wished, 
so he said, to drag her into his life of priva- 
tion and shifts. She thought to herself that 
perhaps he had been right; and thus insen- 
sibly, like an indulgent mother or elder sister, 
who wishes to close her eyes and her ears 
68 


The Old Maid 


against everything, to forgive again and for- 
give always, she excused him. She tried to 
remember nothing but those months of ten- 
derness and of ecstasy, those months of hap- 
piness, and that he had been the first, the 
only man, who in the course of her unhappy 
wasted life had given her a moment's peace, 
a day dream of bliss, and had made her happy, 
youthful and loving. 

He had been charitable toward her, and 
she would be so a hundredfold toward him. 
So she grew happy again, when she said to 
herself that she would be his benefactress, 
that even with his hard heart he could not, 
without some feelings of gratitude and emo- 
tion, accept the sacrifice from a woman, who, 
like so many others, might have returned 
him evil for evil, but who preferred to be kind 
and maternal, after having been in love with 
him. 

And that resolution transfigured her, re- 
stored to her, temporarily, something of her 
vanished youth. A poor, heroic saint among 
saints, she took refuge in a Carmelite convent, 
so as to escape from this returning tempta- 
tion, and bequeathed everything of which she 
could lawfully dispose to Monsieur de Gedre. 

69 






THE LANCER’S WIFE, 


was after Bourbaki’s de- 
feat in the east of France. 
The army, broken up, deci- 
mated and worn out, had 
been obliged to retreat into 
Switzerland, after that ter- 
rible campaign. It was 
only the short duration of the struggle that 
saved a hundred and fifty thousand men from 
certain death. Hunger, the terrible cold, and 
forced marches in the snow without boots, 
over bad mountainous roads, had caused the 
franc s-tireurs especially the greatest suffering, 
for we were without tents and almost without 
food, always in front when we were marching 
toward Belfort, and in the rear when returning 
by the Jura. Of our brigade, that had num- 
bered twelve hundred men on the first of 
January, there remained only twenty-two pale, 
thin, ragged wretches when at length we suc- 
ceeded in reaching Swiss territory. 

7i 



De Maupassant 


There we were safe and could rest. Every- 
body knows what sympathy was shown to 
the unfortunate French army, and how well 
it was cared for. We all gained fresh life, 
and those who had been rich and happy before 
the war declared that they had never exper- 
ienced a greater feeling of comfort than they 
did then. J ust think ! We actually had some- 
thing to eat every day, and could sleep every 
night. 

Meanwhile, the war continued in the east 
of France, which had been excluded from the 
armistice. Besan^on still kept the enemy in 
check, and the latter had their revenge by 
ravaging the Comte Franche. Sometimes we 
heard that they had approached quite close 
to the frontier, and we saw Swiss troops, who 
were to form a line of observation between 
us^and the Germans, set out on their march. 

But this hurt our pride, and as we regained 
health and strength the longing for fighting 
laid hold of us. It was disgraceful and irri- 
tating to know that within two or three leagues 
of us the Germans were victorious and inso- 
lent, to feel that we were protected by our 
captivity, and to feel that on that account we 
were powerless against them. 

72 


The Lancer’s Wife 


One day, our captain took five or six of us 
aside, and spoke to us about it, long and 
earnestly. He was a fine fellow, that captain. 
He had been a sub-lieutenant in the Zouaves, 
was tall and thin and as hard as steel, and 
during the whole campaign had given a great 
deal of trouble to the Germans. He fretted 
in inactivity and could not accustom himself 
to the idea of being a prisoner and of doing 
nothing. 

“ Confound it! ” he said to us, “ does it not 
pain you to know that there are a lot of uhlans 
within two hours of us ? Does it not almost 
drive you mad to know that those beggarly 
wretches are walking about as masters in 
our mountains, where six determined men 
might kill a whole troop any day ? I cannot 
endure it any longer, and I must go there.” 

“ But how can you manage it, Captain ?'” 

“ How? It is not very difficult! Just as 
if we had not done a thing or two within the 
last six months, and got out of woods that 
were guarded by men very different from the 
Swiss. The day that you wish to cross over 
into France, I will undertake to get you there.” 

“ That may be; but what shall we do in 
France without any arms ? ” 

73 


De Maupassant 


“ Without arms ? We will get them over 
yonder, by Jove! ” 

“ You are forgetting the treaty,” another 
soldier said; “ we shall run the risk of doing 
the Swiss an injury, if Manteuffel learns that 
they have allowed prisoners to return to 
France.” 

‘‘ Come,” said the captain, “ those are all 
poor reasons. I mean to go and kill some 
Prussians; that is all I care about. If you 
do not wish to do as I do, well and good; only 
say so at once. I can quite well go by myself ; 
I do not require anybody’s company.” 

Naturally we all protested, and as it was 
quite impossible to make the captain alter his 
mind, we felt obliged to promise to go with 
him. We liked him too much to leave him 
in the lurch, since he had never failed us in 
any extremity; and so the expedition was de- 
cided on. 


II. 

The captain had a plan of his own, a plan 
he had been cogitating over for some time. 
A man in that part of the country, whom he 
knew, was going to lend him a cart, and six 
74 


The Lancer’s Wife 


suits of peasants’ clothes. We could hide un- 
der some straw at the bottom of the wagon, 
which would be loaded with Gruyere cheese. 
This cheese he was supposed to be going to 
sell in France. The captain told the sentinels 
that he was taking two friends with him to 
protect his goods, in case anyone should try 
to rob him, which did not seem an extraordi- 
nary precaution. A Swiss officer seemed to 
look at the wagon in a knowing manner, but 
that was in order to impress his soldiers. 
In a word, neither officers nor men made it 
out. 

“ Get on,” the captain said to the horses, 
as he cracked his whip, while our men quietly 
smoked their pipes. I was half suffocated in 
my box, which only admitted the air through 
some holes in front, while at the same time I 
was nearly frozen, for it was terribly cold. 

“ Get on,” the captain said again, and the 
wagon loaded with Gruyere cheese entered 
F ranee. 

The Prussian lines were very badly guarded, 
as the enemy trusted to the watchfulness of 
the Swiss. The sergeant spoke North Ger- 
man, while our captain spoke the bad German 
of the “Four Cantons”; so they could not 

75 


De Maupassant 


understand each other. The sergeant, how- 
ever, pretended to be very intelligent, and in 
order to make us believe that he understood 
us, they allowed us to continue our journey, 
and after traveling for seven hours, being con- 
tinually stopped in the same manner, we ar- 
rived at a small village of the Jura, in ruins, 
at nightfall. 

What were we going to do ? Our only arms 
were the captain's whip, our uniforms, the 
peasants' blouses, and our food the Gruyere 
cheese. Our sole riches consisted in our am- 
munition, packets of cartridges which we had 
stowed away inside some of the huge cheeses. 
We had about a thousand of them, just two 
hundred each ; but then we wanted rifles, and 
they must be chassepots; luckily, however, the 
captain was a bold man of an inventive mind, 
and this was the plan that he hit upon: 

While three of us remained hidden in a cellar 
in the abandoned village, he continued his 
journey as far as Besan^on with the empty 
wagon and one man. The town was invested, 
but one can always make one's way into a 
town among the hills by crossing the table- 
land till within about ten miles of the walls, 
and then byfollowingpathsand ravines onfoot. 

7 6 


The Lancer’s Wife 


They left their wagon at Omans, among the 
Germans, and escaped out of it at night on 
foot, so as to gain the heights which border 
the river Doubs; the next day they entered 
Besan^on, where there were plenty of chasse- 
pots. There were nearly forty thousand of 
them left in the arsenal, and General Roland, 
a brave marine, laughed at the captain’s daring 
project, but let him have six rifles and wished 
him “ good luck.” There he also found his 
wife, who had been through all the war with 
us before the campaign in the east, and who 
had been prevented only by illness from con- 
tinuing with Bourbaki’s army. She had re- 
covered, however, in spite of the cold, which 
was growing more and more intense, and in 
spite of the numberless privations that 
awaited her, she insisted on accompanying 
her husband. He was obliged to give way 
to her, and all three, the captain, his wife, and 
our comrade, started on their expedition. 

Going was nothing in comparison to re- 
turning. They were obliged to travel by 
night, so as to avoid meeting anybody, as the 
possession of six rifles would have made them 
liable to suspicion. But in spite of every- 
thing, a week after leaving us, the captain 
77 


De Maupassant 


and his “ two men ” were back with us again. 
The campaign was about to begin. 

III. 

The first night of his arrival, the captain 
began it himself. Under the pretext of ex- 
amining the country round, he went along the 
highroad. I must tell you that the little vil- 
lage which served as our fortress was a small 
collection of poor, badly built houses, which 
had been deserted long before. It lay on a 
steep slope, which terminated in a wooded 
plain. The country people sold wood; they 
sent it down the ravines, which are called 
coulees locally, and which led down to the 
plain, and there they stacked it into piles, 
which were sold thrice a year to the wood 
merchants. The spot where this market was 
held was indicated by two small houses by 
the side of the highroad, which served for 
public-houses. The captain had gone down 
there by one of these coulees. 

He had been gone about half an hour, and 
we were on the lookout at the top of the 
ravine, when we heard a shot. The captain 
had ordered us not to stir, and only to come 
78 


The Lancer’s Wife 


to him when we heard him blow his trumpet. 
It was made of a goat’s horn, and could be 
heard a league off, but it gave no sound, and 
in spite of our cruel anxiety we were obliged 
to wait in silence, with our rifles by our side. 

To go down these coulees is easy: you need 
only let yourself glide down; but it is more 
difficult to get up again. You have to scramble 
up by catching hold of the hanging branches 
of the trees, and sometimes on all fours, by 
sheer strength. A whole mortal hour passed, 
and still the captain did not come, nothing 
moved in the brushwood. The captain’s wife 
began to grow impatient; what could he be 
doing ? Why did he not call us ? Did the 
shot that we had heard proceed from an enemy 
and had he killed or wounded our leader, her 
husband ? They did not know what to think, 
but I myself fancied that either he was dead 
or that his enterprise was successful. I was 
merely anxious and curious to know which. 

Suddenly, we heard the sound of his trum- 
pet, and were much surprised that instead of 
coming from below, as we had expected, it 
came from the village behind us. What did 
that mean ? It was a mystery to us, but the 
same idea struck us all, that he had been 
79 


De Maupassant 


killed, and that the Prussians were blowing 
the trumpet to draw us into an ambush. We 
therefore returned to the cottage, keeping a 
careful lookout, with our fingers on the trigger 
and hiding under the branches. But his wife, 
in spite of our entreaties, rushed on, leaping 
like a tigress. She thought that she had to 
avenge her husband, and had fixed the bayonet 
to her rifle. We lost sight of her at the mo- 
ment that we heard the trumpet again, and a 
few moments later we heard her calling out to 
us: 

“Come on! come on! he is alive! it is he!” 

We hastened on, and saw the captain smok- 
ing his pipe at the entrance of the village, but 
strangely enough he was on horseback. 

“ Ah! ” said he to us, “ you see that there 
is something to be done here. Here I am on 
horseback already; I knocked over a uhlan 
yonder, and took his horse; I suppose they 
were guarding the wood, but it was by drink- 
ing and swilling in clover. One of them, the 
sentry at the door, had not time to see me 
before I gave him a sugarplum in his stomach, 
and then, before the others could come out, 
I jumped on to the horse and was off like a 
shot. Eight or ten of them followed me, I 
80 


The Lancer’s Wife 


think, but I took the crossroads through the 
wood; I have got scratched and torn a bit, 
but here I am. And now, my good fellows, 
attention, and take care! Those brigands will 
not rest until they have caught us, and we 
must receive them with rifle bullets. Come 
along; let us take up our posts! ” 

We set out. One of us took up his position 
a good way from the village of the crossroads; 
I was posted at the entrance of the main 
street, where the road from the level country 
enters the village, while the two others, with 
the captain and his wife, took up positions in 
the middle of the village, near the church, 
whose tower served for an observatory and 
citadel. 

We had not been in our places long before 
we heard a shot followed by another; then 
two, then three. The first was evidently a 
chassepot , — one recognized it by the sharp 
report, which sounds like the crack of a whip, 
— while the other three came from the lancers' 
carbines. 

The captain was furious. He had given 
orders to the outpost to let the enemy pass, 
and merely to follow them at a distance if 
they marched toward the village, and to join 
81 


De Maupassant 


me when they had gone well between the 
houses. Then they were to appear suddenly, 
take the patrol between two fires, and not allow 
a single man to escape, for posted as we were, 
the six of us could have hemmed in ten Prus- 
sians, if needful. 

“ That confounded Piedelot has roused 

them, ” the captain said, “ and they will not 
venture to come on blindfold any longer. And 
then I am quite sure that he has managed 
to get wounded himself somehow or other, 
for we hear nothing of him. It serves him 
right; why did he not obey orders?” And 

then, after a moment, he grumbled in his 
beard: “ After all, I am sorry for the poor 
fellow; he is so brave and shoots so well! ” 

The captain was right in his conjectures. 
We waited until evening, without seeing the 
uhlans; they had retreated after the first at- 
tack, but unfortunately we had not seen Pie- 
delot either. Was he dead or a prisoner ? 
When night came the captain proposed that 
we should go out and look for him, and so 
all three of us started. At the crossroads 
we found a broken rifle and some blood, while 
the ground was trampled down. But we did 
not find either a wounded man or a dead 
82 


The Lancer’s Wife 


body, although we searched every thicket. 
At midnight we returned without having dis- 
covered anything of our unfortunate comrade. 

“ It is very strange/’ the captain growled. 
“ They must have killed him and thrown him 
into the bushes somewhere; they cannot pos- 
sibly have taken him prisoner, as he would 
have called out for help. I cannot understand 
it all.” Just as he said that, bright red 
flames shot up in the direction of the inn on 
the road, which illuminated the sky. 

“Scoundrels! cowards!” shouted the cap- 
tain. “ I will bet that they have set fire to 
the two houses in the market-place, in order 
to have their revenge, and then they will 
scuttle off without saying a word. They will 
be satisfied with having killed a man and 
setting fire to two houses. All right. It shall 
not pass over like that. We must go for 
them; they will not like to leave their illumi- 
nations in order to fight.” 

“ It would be a great stroke of luck if we 
could set Piedelot free at the same time,” 
said some one. 

All five of us set off, full of rage and hope. 
In twenty minutes we had got to the bottom 
of the coulee , and had not yet seen anyone 
83 


De Maupassant 


when within a hundred yards of the inn. The 
fire was behind the house, and so all that we 
saw of it was the reflection above the roof. 
However, we were walking rather slowly, as if 
we were afraid of a trap, when suddenly we 
heard Piedelot’s well-known voice. It had a 
strange sound, however, for it was at the 
same time dull and vibrant, stifled and clear, 
as if he was calling out as loud as he could 
with a gag in his mouth. He seemed to be 
hoarse and panting, and the unlucky fellow 
kept exclaiming: “ Help! Help!” 

We sent all thoughts of prudence to the 
devil and in two bounds were at the back of 
the inn, where a terrible sight met our eyes. 

IV. 

Piedelot was being burned alive. He was 
writhing in the middle of a heap of fagots, 
against a stake to which they had fastened 
him, and the flames were licking him with 
their sharp tongues. When he saw us, his 
tongue seemed to stick in his throat, he 
drooped his head, and seemed as if he were 
going to die. It was only the affair of a mo- 
ment to upset the burning pile, to scatter the 
84 


The Lancer’s Wife 


embers, and to cut the ropes that fastened 
him. 

Poor fellow! In what a terrible state we 
found him. The evening before he had had 
his left arm broken, and it seemed as if he 
had been badly beaten since then, for his 
whole body was covered with wounds, bruises 
and blood. The flames had also begun their 
work on him, and he had two large burns, 
one on his loins, and the other on his right 
thigh, and his beard and his hairwere scorched. 
Poor Piedelot! 

Nobody knows the terrible rage we felt at 
this sight! We would have rushed headlong 
at a hundred thousand Prussians. Our thirst 
for vengeance was intense; but the cowards 
had run away, leaving their crime behind 
them. Where could we find them now? 
Meanwhile, however, the captain’s wife was 
looking after Piedelot, and dressing his wounds 
as best she could, while the captain himself 
shook hands with him excitedly. In a few 
minutes he came to himself. 

“ Good morning, Captain, good morning, 
all of you,” he said. “Ah! the scoundrels, 
the wretches! Why, twenty of them came 
to surprise us.” 


85 


De Maupassant 


“ Twenty, do you say ? ” 

“ Yes, there was a whole band of them, and 
that is why I disobeyed orders. Captain, and 
fired on them, for they would have killed you 
all. So I preferred to stop them. That 
frightened them, and they did not venture to 
go further than the crossroads. They were 
such cowards. Four of them shot at me at 
twenty yards, as if I had been a target, and 
then they slashed me with their swords. My 
arm was broken, so that I could only use my 
bayonet with one hand.” 

“ But why did you not call for help ? ” 

“ I took good care not to do that, for you 
would all have come, and you would neither 
have been able to defend me nor yourselves, 
being only five against twenty.” 

“ You know that we should not have al- 
lowed you to have been taken, poor old fel- 
low.” 

“ I preferred to die by myself, don’t you 
see! I did not want to bring you there, for 
it would have been a mere ambush.” 

“ Well, we will not talk about it any more. 
Do you feel rather easier ? ” 

“ No, I am suffocating. I know that I can- 
not live much longer. The brutes! They 
86 


The Lancer’s Wife 


tied me to a tree, and beat me till I was half 
dead, and then they shook my broken arm, 
but I did not make a sound. I would rather 
have bitten my tongue out than have called 
out before them. Now I can say what I am 
suffering and shed tears; it does one good. 
Thank you, my kind friends.” 

“ Poor Piedelot! But we will avenge you, 
you may be sure! ” 

“ Yes, yes, I want you to do that. Es- 
pecially, there is a woman among them, who 
passes as the wife of the lancer whom the 
captain killed yesterday. She is dressed like 
a lancer, and it was she who tortured me the 
most yesterday, and suggested burning me. 
In fact, it was she who set fire to the wood. 
Oh! the wretch, the brute! Ah! how I am 
suffering! My loins, my arms!” and he fell 
back panting and exhausted, writhing in his 
terrible agony, while the captain's wife wiped 
the perspiration from his forehead. We all 
shed tears of grief and rage, as if we had been 
children. I will not describe the end to you; 
he died half an hour later, but before that he 
told us in which direction the enemy had gone. 
When he was dead, we gave ourselves time 
to bury him, and then we set out in pursuit 

87 


De Maupassant 


of them, with our hearts full of fury and 
hatred. 

“We will throw ourselves on the whole 
Prussian army, if it be needful/' the captain 
said, “ but we will avenge Piedelot. We must 
catch those scoundrels. Let us swear to die, 
rather than not to find them, and if I am 
killed first, these are my orders: all the pris- 
oners that you make are to be shot imme- 
diately, and as for the lancer's wife, she is 
to be tortured before she is put to death." 

“ She must not be shot, because she is a 
woman," the captain's wife said. “ If you 
survive, I am sure that you would not shoot 
a woman. Torturing her will be quite suf- 
ficient. But if you are killed in this pursuit, 
I want one thing, and that is to fight with her; 
I will kill her with my own hands, and the 
others can do what they like with her if she 
kills me." 

“ We will torture her! We will burn her! 
We will tear her to pieces! Piedelot shall be 
avenged, an eye for an eye, a tooth for a 
tooth! " 


The Lancer’s Wife 


V. 

The next morning we unexpectedly fell on 
an outpost of uhlans four leagues away. Sur- 
prised by our sudden attack, they were not 
able to mount their horses, nor even to de- 
fend themselves, and in a few moments we had 
five prisoners, corresponding to our own num- 
ber. The captain questioned them, and from 
their answers we felt certain that they were 
the same whom we had encountered the pre- 
vious day. Then a very curious operation 
took place. One of us was told off to ascer- 
tain their sex, and nothing can depict our joy 
when we discovered what we were seeking 
among them, the female executioner who had 
tortured our friend. 

The four others were shot on the spot, with 
their backs toward us and close to the muzzles 
of our rifles, and then we turned our attention 
to the woman. What were we going to do 
with her ? 1 must acknowledge that we were 
all of us in favor of shooting her. Hatred, 
and the wish to avenge Piedelot, had extin- 
guished all pity in us, and we had forgotten 
that we were going to shoot a woman. But 
89 


De Maupassant 


a woman reminded us of it, the captain's wife; 
at her entreaties, therefore, we determined to 
keep her a prisoner. The captain's poor wife 
was to be severely punished for this act of 
clemency. 

The next day we heard that the armistice 
had been extended to the eastern part of 
France, and we had to put an end to our 
little campaign. Two of us, who belonged to 
the neighborhood, returned home. So there 
remained only four of us, all told: the captain, 
his wife, and two men. We belonged to Be- 
san9on, which was still being besieged in spite 
of the armistice. 

“ Let us stop here," said the captain. “ I 
cannot believe that the war is going to end 
like this. The devil take it! Surely there are 
men still left in France, and now is the time 
to prove what they are made of. The spring 
is coming on, and the armistice is only a trap 
laid for the Prussians. During the time that 
it lasts, a new army will be formed, and some 
fine morning we shall fall upon them again. 
We shall be ready, and we have a hostage — 
let us remain here." 

We fixed our quarters there. It was ter- 
ribly cold, and we did not go out much, as 
90 


The Lancer’s Wife 


somebody had always to keep the female pris- 
oner in sight. 

She was sullen and never spoke save to 
refer to her husband, whom the captain had 
killed. She looked at him continually with fierce 
eyes, and we felt that she was tortured by a 
wild longing for revenge. That seemed to us to 
be the most suitable punishment forthe terrible 
torments that she had made Piedelot suffer, 
for impotent vengeance is such intense pain. 

Alas! we who knew how to avenge our com- 
rade ought to have known that this woman 
would find a way to avenge her husband, and 
should have been on our guard. It is true 
that one of us kept watch every night, and 
that at first we tied her by a long rope to the 
great oak bench that was fastened to the wall. 
But, by and by, as she had never tried to 
escape, in spite of her hatred for us, we re- 
laxed our extreme prudence and allowed her 
to sleep somewhere else, and without being 
tied. What had we to fear ? She was at 
the end of the room, a man was on guard at 
the door, and between her and the sentinel 
the captain's wife and two other men used 
to lie. She was alone and unarmed against 
four, so there could be no danger. 

9i 


De Maupassant 


One night when we were asleep, and the 
captain was on guard, the lancer’s wife was 
lying more quietly in her corner than usual. 
She had even smiled during the evening for 
the first time since she had been our prisoner. 
Suddenly, however, in the middle of the night, 
we were awakened by a terrible cry. We got 
up, groping about. Scarcely were we up when 
we stumbled over a furious couple who were 
rolling about and fighting on the ground. It 
was the captain and the lancer’s wife. We 
threw ourselves on to them and separated 
them in a moment. She was shouting and 
laughing, and he seemed to have the death 
rattle. All this took place in the dark. Two 
of us held her, and when a light was struck, 
a terrible sight met our eyes. The captain 
was lying on the floor in a pool of blood, with 
an enormous wound in his throat, and his 
sword bayonet, that had been taken from 
his rifle, was sticking in the red, gaping wound. 
A few minutes afterward he died, without 
having been able to utter a word. 

His wife did not shed a tear. Her eyes 
were dry, her throat was contracted, and she 
looked at the lancer’s wife steadfastly, and 
with a calm ferocity that inspired fear. 

92 


The Lancer’s Wife 


“ This woman belongs to me/' she said to 
us suddenly. “ You swore to me not a week 
ago to let me kill her as I chose if she killed 
my husband, and you must keep your oath. 
You must fasten her securely to the fireplace, 
upright against the back of it, and then you 
can go where you like, but far from here. 
I will take my revenge on her to myself. 
Leave the captain’s body, and we three, he, 
she, and I, will remain here.” 

We obeyed and went away. She promised 
to write to us to Geneva, as we were returning 
there. 


VI. 

Two days later, I received the following 
letter, dated the day after we had left. It 
had been written at an inn on the highroad: 

“ My Friend: 

“ I am writing to you, according to my promise. For 
the moment I am at this inn, where I have just handed 
my prisoner over to a Prussian officer. 

“ I must tell you, my friend, that this poor woman left 
two children in Germany. She had followed her husband, 
whom she adored, as she did not wish him to be exposed to 
the risks of war by himself, and as her children were with 
their grandparents. I have learned all this since yesterday, 
and it has turned my ideas of vengeance into more humane 

93 


De Maupassant 


feelings. At the very moment when I felt pleasure in in- 
sulting this woman, and in threatening her with the most 
fearful torments — in recalling Piedelot, who had been 
burned alive, and in threatening her with a similar death, 
she looked at me coldly, and said: 

“ ‘ Why should you reproach me, Frenchwoman ? You 
think that you will do right in avenging your husband’s 
death, is not that so ? * 

“ ‘ Yes,’ I replied. 

“ ‘ Very well then; in killing him, I did what you are go- 
ing to do in burning me. I avenged my husband, for your 
husband killed him.’ 

“ ‘ Well,’ I replied, ‘ as you approve of this vengeance, 
prepare to endure it.’ 

“‘I do not fear it.’ 

“ And in fact she did not seem to have lost courage. 
Her face was calm, and she looked at me without tremb- 
ling, while I brought wood and dried leaves together, and 
feverishly threw upon them the powder from some cart- 
ridges, to make her funeral pile the more cruel. 

“ I hesitated in my thoughts of persecution for a moment. 
But the captain’s body was there, pale and covered with 
blood, and he seemed to be looking at me with large, 
glassy eyes, and I applied myself to my work again after 
kissing his pale lips. Suddenly, however, on raising my 
head, I saw that she was crying, and I felt rather sur- 
prised. 

“ ‘ So you are frightened ? ’ I said to her. 

** ‘ No, but when I saw you kiss your husband, I thought 
of mine, of all whom I love.’ 

“ She continued to sob, but stopping suddenly she said 
to me in broken words, and in a low voice: 

“ * Have you any children ? ’ 

“ A shiver ran over me, for I guessed that this poor 
woman had some. She asked me to look in a pocketbook 

94 






&si/3> t>oow t/foi/o*ia 
as Y/39I be' 

'tsd e^on 

I/^eouS^ 


r 









The Lancer’s Wife 


which was in her bosom, and in it I saw two photographs 
of quite young children, a boy and a girl, with those kind, 
gentle, chubby faces that German children have. In it 
there were also two locks of light hair and a letter in a 
large childish hand, beginning with German words which 
meant: ‘My dear little mother.’ 

“ I could not restrain my tears, my dear friend, and so 
I untied her, and without venturing to look at the face of 
my poor, dead husband, who was not to be avenged, I went 
with her as far as the inn. She is free; I have just left her, 
and she kissed me with tears. I am going upstairs to my 
husband; come as soon as possible, my dear friend, to look 
for our two bodies.” 

I set off with all speed, and when I arrived 
there was a Prussian patrol at the cottage. 
When I asked what it all meant, I was told 
that there was a captain of franc s-tireurs and 
his wife inside, both dead. I gave their names; 
they saw that I knew them, and I begged to 
be allowed to undertake their funeral. 

“ Somebody has already undertaken it,” 
was the reply. “ Go in if you wish to, as you 
knew them. You can settle about their fune- 
ral with their friend.” 

I went in. The captain and his wife were 
lying side by side on a bed, and were covered 
by a sheet. I raised it, and saw that the 
woman had inflicted a wound in her throat 
similar to that from which her husband had 
died. 


95 


De Maupassant 


At the side of the bed there sat, watching 
and weeping, the woman who had been men- 
tioned to me as their last friend. It was the 
lancer's wife. 



9 6 


THE 

SEQUEL TO A DIVORCE 

ERTAINLY, although he had 
been engaged in the most 
extraordinary, most un- 
likely, most extravagant, 
and funniest cases, and had 
won legal games without a 
trump in his hand, — al- 
though he had worked out the obscure law 
of divorce, as if it had been a Californian 
gold mine, — Maitre Garulier,* the celebrated, 
the only Garrulier, could not check a move- 
ment of surprise, nor a disheartening shake 
of the head, nor a smile, when the Countess 
de Baudemont explained her affairs to him 
for the first time. 

He had just opened his correspondence, and 
his slender hands, on which he bestowed the 
greatest attention, buried themselves in a 
heap of female letters, and one might have 
* Title given to advocates in France. 

97 



De Maupassant 


thought oneself in the confessional of a fash- 
ionable preacher, so impregnated was the at- 
mosphere with delicate perfumes. 

Immediately — even before she had said a 
word — with the sharp glance of a practised 
man of the world, that look which made beau- 
tiful Madame de Serpenoise say: “ He strips 
your heart bare!” the lawyer had classed her 
in the third category. Those who suffer came 
into his first category, those who love, into 
the second, and those who are bored, into 
the third — and she belonged to the latter. 

She was a pretty windmill, whose sails 
turned and flew round, and fretted the blue 
sky with a delicious shiver of joy, as it were, 
and had the brain of a bird, in which four 
correct and healthy ideas cannot exist side 
by side, and in which all dreams and every 
kind of folly are engulfed, like a great kaleid- 
oscope. 

Incapable of hurting a fly, emotional, char- 
itable, with a feeling of tenderness for the 
street girl who sells bunches of violets for a 
penny, for a cab horse which a driver is ill- 
using, for a melancholy pauper's funeral, when 
the body, without friends or relations to fol- 
low it, is being conveyed to the common grave; 

98 


The Sequel to a Divorce 


doing anything that might afford five minutes' 
amusement, not caring if she made men miser- 
able for the rest of their days, and taking 
pleasure in kindling passions which consumed 
men's whole being, looking upon life as too 
short to be anything elsejhan one uninter- 
rupted round of gaiety and enjoyment, she 
thought that people might find plenty of time 
for being serious and reasonable in the evening 
of life, when they are at the bottom of the 
hill, and their looking-glasses reveal a wrinkled 
face, surrounded with white hair. 

A thorough-bred Parisian, whom one would 
follow to the end of the world, like a poodle; 
a woman whom one adores with the head, the 
heart, and the senses until one is nearly driven 
mad, as soon as one has inhaled the delicate 
perfume that emanates from her dress and 
hair, or touched her skin, and heard her laugh; 
a woman for whom one would fight a duel and 
risk one's life without a thought; for whom a 
man would remove mountains, and sell his 
soul to the devil several times over, if the 
devil were still in the habit of frequenting 
the places of bad repute on this earth. 

She had perhaps come to see this Garrulier, 
whom she had so often heard mentioned at 


99 


De Maupassant 


five-o’clock teas, so as to be able to describe 
him to her female friends subsequently in 
droll phrases, imitating his gestures and the 
unctuous inflections of his voice, in order, 
perhaps, to experience some new sensation, 
or, perhaps, for the sake of dressing like a 
woman who was going to try for a divorce; 
and, certainly, the whole effect was perfect. 
She wore a splendid cloak embroidered with 
jet — which gave an almost serious effect to 
her golden hair, to her small slightly turned- 
up nose, with its quivering nostrils, and to 
her large eyes, full of enigma and fun — over 
a dark stuff dress, which fastened at the neck 
by a sapphire and a diamond pin. 

The barrister did not interrupt her, but 
allowed her to get excited and to chatter, to 
enumerate her causes for complaint against 
poor Count de Baudemont, who certainly had 
no suspicion of his wife’s escapade, and who 
would have been very much surprised if any- 
one had told him of it at that moment, when 
he was taking his fencing lesson at the club. 

When she had quite finished, he said coolly, 
as if he were throwing a pail of water on some 
burning straw: 

“ But, Madame, there is not the slightest 
, ioo 


The Sequel to a Divorce 


pretext for a divorce in anything that you 
have told me here. The judges would ask 
me whether I took the Law Courts for a 
theater, and intended to make fun of them/' 

And seeing how disheartened she was, — 
that she looked like a child whose favorite 
toy had been broken, that she was so pretty 
that he would have liked to kiss her hands in 
his devotion, and as she seemed to be witty, 
and very amusing, and as, moreover, he had 
no objection to such visits being prolonged, 
when papers had to be looked over, while 
sitting close together, — Maitre Garrulier ap- 
peared to be considering. Taking his chin in 
his hand, he said: 

“ However, I will think it over; there is 
sure to be some dark spot that can be made 
out worse. Write to me, and come and see 
me again/' 

In the course of her visits, that black spot 
had increased so much, and Madame de Bau- 
demont had followed her lawyer's advice so 
punctually, and had played on the various 
strings so skillfully that a few months later, 
after a lawsuit which is still spoken of in the 
Courts of Justice, and during the course of 
which the President had to take off his spec- 
IOI 


De Maupassant 


tacles, and to use his pocket-handkerchief 
noisily, the divorce was pronounced in favor 
of the Countess Marie Anne Nicole Bournet 
de Baudemont, nee de Tanchart de Peothus. 

The Count, who was nonplussed at such an 
adventure turning out so seriously, first of 
all flew into a terrible rage, rushed off to the 
lawyer’s office and threatened to cut off his 
knavish ears for him. But when his access 
of fury was over, and he thought of it, he 
shrugged his shoulders and said: 

“ All the better for her, if it amuses her! ” 

Then he bought Baron Silber stein’s yacht, 
and with some friends got up a cruise to 
Ceylon and India. 

Marie Anne began by triumphing, and felt 
as happy as a schoolgirl going home for the 
holidays; she committed every possible folly, 
and soon, tired, satiated and disgusted, began 
to yawn, cried, and found out that she had 
sacrificed her happiness, like a millionaire who 
has gone mad and has cast his banknotes and 
shares into the river, and that she was nothing 
more than a disabled waif and stray. Con- 
sequently, she now married again, as the soli- 
tude of her home made her morose from 
morning till night; and then, besides, she found 
102 


The Sequel to a Divorce 


a woman requires a mansion when she goes 
into society, to race meetings, or to the theater. 

And so, while she became a marchioness, 
and pronounced her second “Yes” before a 
very few friends, at the office of the mayor 
of the English urban district, malicious people 
in the Faubourg were making fun of the whole 
affair, and affirming this and that, whether 
rightly or wrongly, and comparing the present 
husband to the former one, even declaring 
that he had partially been the cause of the 
former divorce. Meanwhile Monsieur de Bau- 
demont was wandering over the four quarters 
of the globe trying to overcome his homesick- 
ness, and to deaden his longing for love, which 
had taken possession of his heart and of his 
body, like a slow poison. 

He traveled through the most out-of-the- 
way places, and the most lonely countries, 
and spent months and months at sea, and 
plunged into every kind of dissipation and 
debauchery. But neither the supple forms 
nor the luxurious gestures of the bayaderes, 
nor the large passive eyes of the Creoles, nor 
flirtations with English girls with hair the 
color of new cider, nor nights of waking dreams 
when he saw new constellations in the sky, 
103 


De Maupassant 


nor dangers during which a man thinks it is 
all over with him, and mutters a few words 
of prayer in spite of himself, when the waves 
are high, and the sky black, nothing was able 
to make him forget that little Parisian woman 
who smelled so sweet that she might have 
been taken for a bouquet of rare flowers; who 
was so coaxing, so curious, so funny; who 
never had the same caprice, the same smile, 
or the same look twice, and who, at bottom, 
was worth more than many others, either 
saints or sinners. 

He thought of her constantly, during long 
hours of sleeplessness. He carried her por- 
trait about with him in the breast pocket of 
his pea-jacket — a charming portrait in which 
she was smiling, and showing her white teeth 
between her half-open lips. Her gentle eyes 
with their magnetic look had a happy, frank 
expression, and from the mere arrangement 
of her hair one could see that she was fair 
among the fair. 

He used to kiss that portrait of the woman 
who had been his wife as if he wished to efface 
it, would look at it for hours, and then throw 
himself down on the netting and sob like a 
child as he looked at the infinite expanse 
104 


The Sequel to a Divorce 


before him, seeming to see their lost happi- 
ness, the joys of their perished affections, and 
the divine remembrance of their love, in the 
monotonous waste of green waters. And he 
tried to accuse himself for all that had oc- 
curred, and not to be angry with her, to 
think that his grievances were imaginary, and 
to adore her in spite of everything and always. 

And so he roamed about the world, tossed 
to and fro, suffering and hoping he knew not 
what. He ventured into the greatest dangers, 
and sought for death just as a man seeks for 
his mistress, and death passed close to him 
without touching him, perhaps amused at his 
grief and misery. 

For he was as wretched as a stone-breaker, 
as one of those poor devils who work and 
nearly break their backs over the hard flints 
the whole day long, under the scorching sun 
or the cold rain; and Marie Anne herself was 
not happy, for she was pining for the past 
and remembered their former love. 

At last, however, he returned to France, 
changed, tanned by exposure, sun, and rain, 
and transformed as if by some witch’s philter. 

Nobody would have recognized the elegant 
and effeminate clubman, in this corsair with 
105 


De Maupassant 


broad shoulders, a skin the color of tan, with 
very red lips, who rolled a little in his walk; 
who seemed to be stifled in his black dress- 
coat, but who still retained the distinguished 
manners and bearing of a nobleman of the 
last century, one of those who, when he was 
ruined, fitted out a privateer, and fell upon 
the English wherever he met them, from St. 
Malo to Calcutta. And wherever he showed 
himself his friends exclaimed: 

“Why! Is that you? I should never have 
known you again ! ” 

He was very nearly starting off again im- 
mediately; he even telegraphed orders to 
Havre to get the steam-yacht ready for sea 
directly, when he heard that Marie Anne had 
married again. 

He saw her in the distance, at the Theatre 
Fran$ais one Tuesday, and when he noticed 
how pretty, how fair, how desirable she was, 
— looking so melancholy, with all the ap- 
pearance of an unhappy soul that regrets 
something, — his determination grew weaker, 
and he delayed his departure from week to 
week, and waited, without knowing why, until, 
at last, worn out with the struggle, watching 
her wherever she went, more in love with her 
106 


The Sequel to a Divorce 


than he had ever been before, he wrote her 
long, mad, ardent letters in which his passion 
overflowed like a stream of lava. 

He altered his handwriting, as he remem- 
bered her restless brain, and her many whims. 
He sent her the flowers which he knew she 
liked best, and told her that she was his life, 
that he was dying of waiting for her, of long- 
ing for her, for her, his idol. 

At last, very much puzzled and surprised, 
guessing — who knows? — from the instinc- 
tive beating of her heart, and her general 
emotion, that it must be he this time, he 
whose soul she had tortured with such cold 
cruelty, and knowing that she could make 
amends for the past and bring back their 
former love, she replied to him, and granted 
him the meeting that he asked for. She fell 
into his arms, and they both sobbed with 
joy and ecstasy. Their kisses were those 
which lips give only when they have lost each 
other and found each other again at last, 
when they meet and exhaust themselves in 
each others' looks, thirsting for tenderness, 
love, and enjoyment. 


07 


De Maupassant 


Last week Count de Baudemont carried off 
Marie Anne quietly and coolly, just as one 
resumes possession of one's house on return- 
ing from a journey, and drives out the in- 
truders. And when Maitre Garrulier was told 
of this unheard-of scandal, he rubbed his 
hands — the long, delicate hands of a sensual 
prelate — and exclaimed: 

“ That is absolutely logical, and I should 
like to be in their place." 



108 


THE ENGLISHMAN 


HEY made a circle around 
Judge Bermutier, who was 
giving his opinion of the 
mysterious affair that had 
happened at Saint-Cloud. 
For a month Paris had 
doted on this inexplicable 
crime. No one could understand it at all. 

M. Bermutier, standing with his back to 
the chimney, talked about it, discussed the 
divers opinions, but came to no conclusions. 

Many women had risen and come nearer, 
remaining standing, with eyes fixed upon the 
shaven mouth of the magistrate, whence issued 
these grave words. They shivered and vibrated, 
crisp through their curious fear, through that 
eager, insatiable need of terror which haunted 
their souls, torturing them like a hunger. 

One of them, paler than the others, after a 
silence, said: 

I0 9 



De Maupassant 


“ It is frightful. It touches the supernat- 
ural. We shall never know anything about 
it.” 

The magistrate turned toward her, saying: 

“ Yes, Madame, it is probable that we never 
shall know anything about it. As for the 
word ‘ supernatural/ when you come to use 
that, it has no place here. We are in the 
presence of a crime skillfully conceived, very 
skillfully executed, and so well enveloped in 
mystery that we cannot separate the impen- 
etrable circumstances which surround it. 
But, once in my life, I had to follow an affair 
which seemed truly to be mixed up with some- 
thing very unusual. However, it was neces- 
sary to give it up, as there was no means of 
explaining it.” 

Many of the ladies called out at the same 
time, so quickly that their voices sounded as 
one: 

“Oh! tell us about it.” 

M. Bermutier smiled gravely, as judges 
should, and replied: 

“ You must not suppose, for an instant, 
that I, at least, believed there was anything 
superhuman in the adventure. I believe only 
in normal causes. And, if in place of using 
i io 


The Englishman 


the word * supernatural ’ to express what we 
cannot comprehend we should simply use the 
word * inexplicable/ it would be much better. 
In any case, the surrounding circumstances 
in the affair I am going to relate to you, as 
well as the preparatory circumstances, have 
affected me much. Here are the facts: 

“ I was then Judge of Instruction at Ajaccio, 
a little white town lying on the border of an 
admirable gulf that was surrounded on all 
sides by high mountains. 

“ What I particularly had to look after there 
were the affairs of vendetta. Some of them 
were superb; as dramatic as possible, fero- 
cious, and heroic. We find there the most 
beautiful subjects of vengeance that one could 
dream of— hatred a century old, appeased for 
a moment but never extinguished, abominable 
plots, assassinations becoming massacres, and 
almost glorious battles. For two years I 
heard of nothing but the price of blood, of 
the terribly prejudiced Corsican who is bound 
to avenge all injury upon the person of him 
who is the cause of it, or upon his nearest 
descendants. I saw old men and infants, 
cousins, with their throats cut, and my head 
was full of these stories. 


De Maupassant 


“ One day we learned that an Englishman 
had rented for some years a little villa at the 
end of the gulf. He had brought with him 
a French domestic, picked up at Marseilles 
on the way. 

“ Soon everybody was occupied with this 
singular person, who lived alone in his house, 
only going out to hunt and fish. He spoke to 
no one, never came to the town, and, every 
morning, practiced shooting with a pistol and 
a rifle for an hour or two. 

" Some legends about him were abroad. 
They pretended that he was a high personage 
fled from his own country for political rea- 
sons; then they affirmed that he was conceal- 
ing himself after committing some frightful 
crime. They even cited some of the particu- 
larly horrible details. 

“ In my capacity of judge, I wished to get 
some information about this man. But it 
was impossible to learn anything. He called 
himself Sir John Rowell. 

“ I contented myself with watching him 
closely; although, in reality, there seemed 
nothing to suspect regarding him. 

“ Nevertheless, as rumors on his account 
continued, grew, and became general, I re- 
1 12 


The Englishman 


solved to try to see this stranger myself, 
and for this purpose began to hunt regularly 
in the neighborhood of his property. 

“ I waited long for an occasion. It finally 
came in the form of a partridge which I shot 
and killed before the very nose of the Eng- 
lishman. My dog brought it to me; but, im- 
mediately taking it, I went and begged Sir 
John Rowell to accept the dead bird, excusing 
myself for intrusion. 

“ He was a tall man with red hair and red 
beard, very large, a sort of placid, polite 
Hercules. He had none of the so-called Brit- 
ish haughtiness, and heartily thanked me for 
the delicacy in French, with a beyond-the- 
Channel accent. At the end of a month we 
had chatted together five or six times. 

“ Finally, one evening, as I was passing by 
his door, I perceived him astride a chair in 
the garden, smoking his pipe. I saluted him 
and he asked me in to have a glass of beer. 
It was not necessary for him to repeat before 
I accepted. 

“ He received me with the fastidious cour- 
tesy of the English, spoke in praise of France 
and of Corsica, and declared that he loved 
that country and that shore. 

IJ 3 


De Maupassant 


“ Then, with great precaution, in the form 
of a lively interest, I put some questions to 
him about his life and his projects. He re- 
sponded without embarrassment, told me that 
he had traveled much, in Africa, in the Indies, 
and in America. He added, laughing: 

“ ‘ I have had many adventures, oh! yes.' 

“ I began to talk about hunting, and he 
gave me many curious details of hunting the 
hippopotamus, the tiger, the elephant, and 
even of hunting the gorilla. 

‘‘I said: ‘All these animals are very for- 
midable/ 

“ He laughed: ‘ Oh! no. The worst animal 
is man/ Then he began to laugh, with the 
hearty laugh of a big contented Englishman. 
He continued: 

“ ‘ I have often hunted man, also/ 

“ He spoke of weapons and asked me to go 
into his house to see his guns of various makes 
and kinds. 

“ His drawing-room was hung in black, in 
black silk embroidered with gold. There were 
great yellow flowers running over the somber 
stuff, shining like fire. 

“ ‘ It is Japanese cloth/ he said. 

“ But in the middle of a large panel, a 
i M 


The Englishman 


strange thing attracted my eye. Upon a square 
of red velvet, a black object was attached. 
I approached and found it was a hand, the 
hand of a man. Not a skeleton hand, white 
and characteristic, but a black, desiccated hand, 
with yellow joints with the muscles bare and 
on them traces of old blood, of blood that 
seemed like a scale, over the bones sharply 
cut off at about the middle of the fore-arm, 
as with a blow of a hatchet. About the wrist 
was an enormous iron chain, riveted, soldered 
to this unclean member, attaching it to the 
wall by a ring sufficiently strong to hold an 
elephant. 

“ I asked: ‘ What is that ? ’ 

“ The Englishman responded tranquilly: 

“ ' It belonged to my worst enemy. It came 
from America. It was broken with a saber, 
cut off with a sharp stone, and dried in the 
sun for eight days. Oh, very good for me, 
that was! ' 

“ I touched the human relic, which must 
have belonged to a colossus. The fingers were 
immoderately long and attached by enormous 
tendons that held the straps of skin in place. 
This dried hand was frightful to see,makingone 
think, naturally, of the vengeance of a savage. 

"5 


De Maupassant 


“I said: 'This man must have been very 
strong/ 

“ With gentleness the Englishman an- 
swered: 

“ ' Oh! yes; but I was stronger than he. I 
put this chain on him to hold him/ 

“ I thought he spoke in jest and replied: 

“ ‘ The chain is useless now that the hand 
cannot escape/ 

"Sir John Rowell replied gravely: 'It al- 
ways wishes to escape. The chain is necessary/ 

" With a rapid, questioning glance, I asked 
myself: ' Is he mad, or is that an unpleasant 
joke ? ’ 

" But the face remained impenetrable, tran- 
quil, and friendly. I spoke of other things 
and admired the guns. 

" Nevertheless, I noticed three loaded re- 
volvers on the pieces of furniture, as if this 
man lived in constant fear of attack. 

" I went there many times after that; then 
for some time I did not go. We had become 
accustomed to his presence: he had become 
indifferent to us. 

" A whole year slipped away. Then, one 
morning, toward the end of November, my 
1 16 


The Englishman 


domestic awoke me with the announcement 
that Sir John Rowell had been assassinated 
in the night. 

“ A half hour later, I entered the English- 
man's house with the central commissary and 
the captain of police. The servant, lost in 
despair, was weeping at the door. I suspected 
him at first, but afterward found that he was 
innocent. 

“ The guilty one could never be found. 

“ Upon entering Sir John’s drawing-room, 
I perceived his dead body stretched out upon 
its back, in the middle of the room. His 
waistcoat was torn, a sleeve was hanging, 
and it was evident that a terrible struggle 
had taken place. 

'‘The Englishman had been strangled! His 
frightfully black and swollen face seemed to 
express an abominable fear ; he held some- 
thing between his set teeth; and his neck, 
pierced with five holes, apparently made with 
a pointed iron, was covered with blood. 

“ A doctor joined us. He examined closely 
the prints of fingers in the flesh and pro- 
nounced these strange words: 

“ ‘ One would think he had been strangled 
by a skeleton.’ 


7 


De Maupassant 


“ A shiver ran down my back and I cast 
my eyes to the place on the wall where I had 
seen the horrible, torn-off hand. It was no 
longer there. The chain was broken and 
hanging. 

" Then I bent over the dead man and found 
in his mouth a piece of one of the fingers of 
the missing hand, cut off, or rather sawed off, 
by the teeth exactly at the second joint. 

“ Then they tried to collect evidence. They 
could find nothing. No door had been forced, 
no window opened, or piece of furniture 
moved. The two watch-dogs on the prem- 
ises had not been aroused. 

“ Here, in a few words, is the deposition 
of the servant: 

“ For a month, his master had seemed agi- 
tated. He had received many letters, which 
he had burned immediately. Often, taking 
a whip, in anger which seemed like dementia, 
he had struck in fury this dried hand, fas- 
tened to the wall and taken, one knew not 
how, at the moment of a crime. 

“ He had retired late and shut himself in 
with care. He always carried arms. Often 
in the night he talked out loud, as if he were 
quarreling with some one. On that night, 
n8 


The Englishman 


however, there had been no noise, and it was 
only on coming to open the windows that the 
servant had found Sir John assassinated. He 
suspected no one. 

“ I communicated what I knew of the death 
to the magistrates and public officers, and 
they made minute inquiries upon the whole 
island. They discovered nothing. 

“ One night, three months after the crime, 
I had a frightful nightmare. It seemed to 
me that I saw that hand, that horrible hand, 
running like a scorpion or a spider along my 
curtains and my walls. Three times I awoke, 
three times I fell asleep and again saw that 
hideous relic galloping about my room, mov- 
ing its fingers like paws. 

“ The next day they brought it to me, 
found in the cemetery upon the tomb where 
Sir John Rowell was interred — for they had 
not been able to find his family. The index 
finger was missing. 

“ This, ladies, is my story. I know no 
more about it.” 

The ladies were terrified, pale, and shiver- 
ing. One of them cried: 

“ But that is not the end, for there was no 
1 19 


De Maupassant 


explanation! We cannot sleep if you do not 
tell us what was- your idea of the reason of it 
all.” i 'Jk&k 

The magistrattPsmiled with severity, and 
answered: 

“Oh! certainly, ladies, but it will spoil all 
your terrible dreams. I simply think that 
the legitimate proprietor of the hand was not 
dead and that he came for it with the one that 
remained to him. But I was never able to 
find out how he did it. It was one kind of 
revenge." 

One of the women murmured: 

“ No, it could not be thus." 

And the Judge of Information, smiling still, 
concluded: 

“ I told you in the beginning that my ex- 
planation would not satisfy you." 



120 


SENTIMENT 


was during the hunting 
season, at the country seat 
of the De Bannevilles. The 
autumn was rainy and dull. 
The red leaves, instead of 
crackling under foot, rotted 
in the hollows after the 

heavy showers. 

The forest, almost leafless, was as humid 
as a bath-room. There was a moldy odor 
under the great trees, stripped of their fruits, 
which enveloped one on entering, as if a lye 
had been made from the steeped herbs, the 
soaked earth, and the continuous rainfall. 
The hunters’ ardor was dampened, the dogs 
were sullen, their tails lowered and their hair 
matted against their sides, while the young 
huntresses, their habits drenched with rain, 
returned each evening depressed in body and 
spirit. 



21 


De Maupassant 


In the great drawing-room, after dinner, 
they played lotto, but without enthusiasm, 
as the wind made a clattering noise upon the 
shutters and forced the old weather vanes 
into a spinning-top tournament. Some one 
suggested telling stories, as they are told in 
books; but no one could think of anything 
very amusing. The hunters narrated some 
of their adventures with the gun, the slaughter 
of wolves, for example; and the ladies racked 
their brains without finding anywhere the 
imagination of Scheherazade. 

They were about to abandon this form of di- 
version, when a young lady, carelessly playing 
with the hand of her old, unmarried aunt, noticed 
a little ring made of blond hair, which she had 
often seen before but thought nothing about. 

Moving it gently about the finger she said, 
suddenly: “Tell us the history of this ring, 
Auntie; it looks like the hair of a child/' 

The old maiden reddened and then grew 
pale, then in a trembling voice she replied: 
“ It is sad, so sad that I never care to speak 
about it. All the unhappiness of my life is 
centered in it. I was young then, but the 
memory of it remains so painful that I weep 
whenever I think of it." 


122 


Sentiment 


They wished very much to hear the story, 
but the aunt refused to tell it; finally, they 
urged so much that she at length consented. 

“ You have often heard me speak of the 
Santeze family, now extinct. I knew the last 
three men of this family. They all died within 
three years in the same manner. This hair 
belonged to the last one. He was thirteen 
years old, when he killed himself for rhe. That 
appears very strange to you, doesn’t it ? 

“ It was a singular race, a race of fools, if 
you will, but of charming fools, of fools for 
love. All, from father to son, had these vio- 
lent passions, waves of emotion which drove 
them to deeds most exalted, to fanatical de- 
votion, and even to crime. Devotion was to 
them what it is to certain religious souls. 
Those who become monks are not of the same 
nature as drawing-room favorites. One might 
almost say, as a proverb, ‘ He loved like a 
Santeze/ 

“ To see them was to divine this character- 
istic. They all had curly hair, growing low 
upon the brow, beard crinkly, eyes large, very 
large, whose rays seemed to penetrate and 
disturb you, without your knowing just why. 

“ The grandfather of the one of whom this 
123 


De Maupassant 


is the only souvenir, after many adventures, 
and some duels on account of entanglements 
with women, when toward sixty became pas- 
sionately taken with the daughter of his far- 
mer. I knew them both. She was blonde, 
pale, distinguished looking, with a soft voice 
and a sweet look, so sweet that she reminded 
one of a madonna. The old lord took her 
home with him, and immediately became so 
captivated that he was unable to pass a 
minute away from her. His daughter and 
his daughter-in-law, who lived in the house, 
found this perfectly natural, so much was 
love a tradition of the family. When one 
was moved by a great passion, nothing sur- 
prised them, and, if anyone expressed a dif- 
ferent notion before them, of disunited lovers, 
or revenge after some treachery, they would 
both say, in the same desolate voice: ‘Oh! 
how he (or she) must have suffered before 
coming to that! ' Nothing more. They were 
moved with pity by all dramas of the heart 
and never spoke slightingly of them, even 
when they were unworthy. 

“ One autumn, a young man, M. de Gradelle, 
invited for the hunting, eloped with the young 
woman. 


124 


Sentiment 


“ M. de Santeze remained calm, as if nothing 
had happened. But one morning they found 
him dead in the kennel in the midst of the dogs. 

“ His son died in the same fashion, in a 
hotel in Paris, while on a journey in 1841, 
after having been deceived by an opera singer. 

“ He left a child of twelve years, and a 
widow, the sister of my mother. She came 
with the little one to live at my father’s 
house, on the De Bertillon estate. I was 
then seventeen. 

“ You could not imagine what an aston- 
ishing, precocious child this little Santeze was. 
One would have said that all the powers of 
tenderness, all the exaltation of his race had 
fallen upon this one, the last. He was always 
dreaming and walking alone in a great avenue 
of elms that led from the house to the woods. 
1 often watched this sentimental youngster 
from my window, as he walked up and down 
with his hands behind his back, with bowed 
head, sometimes stopping to look up, as if 
he saw and comprehended things beyond his 
age and experience. 

“ Often after dinner, on clear nights, he 
would say to me: ‘ Let us go and dream, 
Cousin.’ And we would go together into the 
125 


De Maupassant 


park. He would stop abruptly in the clear 
spaces, where the white vapor floats, that 
soft light with which the moon lights up the 
clearings in the woods, and say to me, seizing 
my hand: ‘Look! Look there! But you do 
not understand, I feel it. If you compre- 
hended, you would be happy. One must know 
how to love/ I would laugh and embrace 
him, this boy, who loved me until his dying 
day. 

“ Often, too, after dinner, he would seat 
himself upon my mother’s knee. ‘ Come, 
Aunt,’ he would say to her, ‘ tell us some 
love story.’ And my mother, for his pleas- 
ure, would tell him all the family legends, the 
passionate adventures of his fathers, as they 
had been told a thousand times, true and 
false. It is these stories that have ruined 
these men; they never concealed anything, 
and prided themselves upon not allowing a 
descendant of their house to lie. 

“ He would be uplifted, this little one, by 
these terrible or affecting tales, and some- 
times he would clap his hands and cry out: 
‘ I, too, I, too, know how to love, better than 
any of them.’ 

“Then he began to pay me his court; a 
126 


Sentiment 


timid, profoundly tender devotion, so droll 
that one could but laugh at it. Each morning 
I had flowers picked by him, and each evening, 
before going to his room, he would kiss my 
hand, murmuring: * I love you!' 

“ I was guilty, very guilty, and I have wept 
since, unceasingly, doing penance all my life, 
by remaining an old maid — or, rather, an 
affianced widow, his widow. I amused my- 
self with this childish devotion, even inciting 
him. I was coquettish, enticing as if he were 
a man, caressing and deceiving. I excited 
this child. It was a joke to me, and a pleas- 
ing diversion to his mother and mine. He 
was twelve years old! Think of it! Who 
would have taken seriously this passion of a 
midget! I kissed him as much as he wished. 
I even wrote sweet letters to him that our 
mothers read. And he responded with letters 
of fire, that I still have. He had a belief all 
his own in our intimacy and love, judging 
himself a man. We had forgotten that he 
was a Santeze! 

“ This lasted nearly a year. One evening, 
in the park, he threw himself down at my 
knees, kissing the hem of my dress, with 
furious earnestness, repeating: * I love you! 

127 


De Maupassant 


I love you! I love you! and shall, even to 
death. If you ever deceive me, understand, 
if you ever leave me for another, I shall do 
as my father did — ' And he added, in a low 
voice that gave one the shivers: ‘ You know 
what I shall do ! ' 

“ Then, as I remained amazed and dumb- 
founded, he got up and, stretching himself 
on tiptoe, for I was much taller than he, he 
repeated in my ear, my name, my first name, 
* Genevieve!' in a voice so sweet, so pretty, 
so tender that I trembled to my very feet. 

“ I muttered: ‘ Let us return to the house! ' 
He said nothing further, but followed me. 
As we were ascending the steps, he stopped 
me and said: ‘ You know if you abandon me, 
I shall kill myself.' 

“ I understood now that I had gone too 
far, and immediately became more reserved. 
When he reproached me for it, one day, I 
answered him: ‘ You are now too large for 
this kind of joking, and too young for serious 
love. I will wait.' 

“ I believed myself freed from him. 

“ He was sent away to school in the autumn. 
When he returned, the following summer, I 
had become engaged. He understood at once, 
128 


Sentiment 


and for over a week preserved so calm an 
appearance that I was much disturbed. 

“ The ninth day, in the morning, I per- 
ceived, on rising, a little paper slipped under 
my door. I seized it and read: ‘ You have 
abandoned me, and you know what I said. 
You have ordered my death. As I do not 
wish to be found by anyone but you, come 
into the park, at the place where last year I 
said that I loved you, and look up/ 

“ I felt myself becoming mad. I dressed 
quickly and ran quickly, so quickly that I fell 
exhausted at the designated spot. His little 
school cap was on the ground in the mud. 
It had rained all night. I raised my eyes and 
saw something concealed by the leaves, for 
there was a wind blowing, a strong wind. 

“ After that, I knew nothing of what I did. 
I shouted, fainted, perhaps, and fell, then got 
up and ran to the house. I recovered my 
reason in my bed, with my mother for my 
pillow. 

“ I at first believed that I had dreamed all 
this in a frightful delirium. I muttered: ‘ And 
he, he — Gontran, where is he — ' 

“ Then they told me it was all true. I 
dared not look at him again, but I asked for 
129 


De Maupassant 


a lock of his blond hair. Here — it — is — ” 
And the old lady held out her hand in a ges- 
ture of despair. 

Then, after much use of her handkerchief 
and drying of her eyes, she continued: “ I 
broke off my engagement without saying why 
— and I — have remained always the — 
widow of this child thirteen years old/' 

Then her head fell upon her breast and she 
wept pensively for a long time. 

And, as they dispersed to their rooms for 
the night, a great hunter, whose quiet she 
had disturbed somewhat, whispered in the 
ear of his neighbor: 

“What a misfortune to be so sentimental! 
Don’t you think so ? ” 



I 3° 


THE FISHERMEN 


T S and Wounds which 
Caused Death. 

That was the heading of 
the charge which brought 
Leopold Renard, upholster- 
er, before the Assize Court. 
Round him were the prin- 
cipal witnesses, Madame Flameche, widow of 
the victim, Louis Ladureau, cabinetmaker, and 
Jean Durdent, plumber. 

Near the criminal was his wife, dressed in 
black, a little ugly woman, who looked like a 
monkey dressed as a lady. 

This is how Renard described the drama: 
“ Good heavens! it is a misfortune of which I 
am the first and last victim, and with which my 
will has nothing to do. The facts are their 
own commentary, Monsieur le President. I 
am an honest man, a hard-working man, an 
upholsterer in the same street for the last 
sixteen years, known, liked, respected, and 

131 



De Maupassant 


esteemed by all, as my neighbors have testi- 
fied, even the porter, who is not folatr every 
day. I am fond of work, I am fond of saving, 

I like honest men, and respectable pleasures. 
That is what has ruined me, so much the worse 
for me; but as my will had nothing to do with 
it, I continue to respect myself. 

“ Every Sunday for the last five years, my 
wife and I have spent the day at Passy. We 
get fresh air, not to say that we are fond of 
fishing — as fond of it as we are of small 
onions. Melie inspired me with that passion, 
the jade; she is more enthusiastic than I am, 
the scold, and all the mischief in this business 
is her fault, as you will see immediately. 

“ I am strong and mild-tempered, without a 
pennyworth of malice in me. But she! oh! 
la! la! she looks insignificant, she is short and 
thin, but she does more mischief than a weasel. 
I do not deny that she has some good qualities; 
she has some, and those very important to a 
man in business. But her character! Just ask 
about it in the neighborhood; even the porter’s 
wife, who has just sent me about my business — 
she will tell you something about it. 

“ Every day she used to find fault with my 
mild temper: ‘I would not put up with this! 

132 


The Fishermen 


I would not put up with that.' If I had lis- 
tened to her, Monsieur le President, I should 
have had at least three bouts of fisticuffs a 
month.” 

Madame Renard interrupted him: “And 
for good reasons too; they laugh best who 
laugh last/’ 

He turned toward her frankly: “ Oh! very 
well, I can blame you, since you were the cause 
of it.” 

Then, facing the President again, he said: 

“ I will continue. We used to go to Passy 
every Saturday evening, so as to be able to 
begin fishing at daybreak the next morning. 
It is a habit which has become second nature 
with us, as the saying is. Three years ago 
this summer I discovered a place, oh! such a 
spot! There, in the shade, were eight feet 
of water at least, and perhaps ten, a hole with 
a retour under the bank, a regular retreat for 
fish and a paradise for any fisherman. I 
might look upon that hole as my property, 
Monsieur le President, as I was its Christopher 
Columbus. Everybody in the neighborhood 
knew it, without making any opposition. 
They used to say: ‘ That is Renard’s place 
and nobody would have gone to it, not even 
133 


De Maupassant 


Monsieur Plumsay, who is renowned, be it 
said without any offense, for appropriating 
other people’s places. 

“ Well, I went as usual to that place, of 
which I felt as certain as if I had owned it. I 
had scarcelygot there on Saturday, when I got 
into ‘ Delila,’ with my wife. ‘ Delila ’ is my 
Norwegian boat, which I had built by Four- 
maise, and which is light and safe. Well, as I 
said, we got into the boat and we were going 
to bait, and for baiting there is nobody to be 
compared with me, and they all know it. 
You want to know with what I bait ? I cannot 
answer that question; it has nothing to do 
with the accident; I cannot answer, that is my 
secret. There are more than three hundred 
people who have asked me; I have been offered 
glasses of brandy and liqueurs, fried fish, mate- 
lots,* to make me tell! But just go and try 
whether the chub will come. Ah! they have 
patted my stomach to get at my secret, my 
recipe. Only my wife knows, and she will not 
tell it, any more than I shall! Is not that so, 
Melie ? " 

* A preparation of several kinds of fish, with a sharp 
sauce. 


34 


The Fishermen 


The President of the Court interrupted him: 

“ Just get to the facts as soon as you can.” 

The accused continued: “ I am getting to 
them; I am getting to them. Well, on Satur- 
day, July 8, we left by the five twenty-five 
train, and before dinner we went to ground- 
bait as usual. The weather promised to keep 
fine, and I said to Melie: ‘All right for to- 
morrow! ’ And she replied: ‘ It looks like it/ 
We never talk more than that together. 

“ And then we returned to dinner. I was 
happy and thirsty, and that was the cause of 
everything. I said to Melie: ‘ Look here, 
Melie, it is fine weather, so suppose I drink a 
bottle of Casque a meche / That is a little 
white wine which we have christened so, be- 
cause if you drink too much of it it prevents 
you from sleeping and is the opposite of a 
nightcap. Do you understand me ? 

“ She replied: ‘ You can do as you please, 
but you will be ill again, and will not be able 
to get up to-morrow/ That was true, sensible, 
prudent, and clear-sighted, I must confess. 
Nevertheless, I could not withstand it, and I 
drank my bottle. It all comes from that. 

“ Well, I could not sleep. By Jove! It kept 
me awake till two o’clock in the morning, and 
135 


De Maupassant 


then I went to sleep so soundly that I should 
not have heard the angel shouting at the Last 
Judgment. 

“ In short, my wife woke me at six o’clock 
and I jumped out of bed, hastily put on my 
trousers and jersey, washed my face and 
jumped on board ‘ Delila/ But it was too 
late, for when I arrived at my hole it was 
already taken. Such a thing had never hap- 
pened to me in three years, and it made me 
feel as if I were being robbed under my own 
eyes. I said to myself, ‘ Confound it all! con- 
found it! ' And then my wife began to nag at 
me. ‘ Eh! What about your Casque a meche ? 
Get along, you drunkard! Are you satisfied, 
you great fool ? ’ I could say nothing, be- 
cause it was all quite true, and so I landed all 
the same near the spot and tried to profit by 
what was left. Perhaps after all the fellow 
might catch nothing, and go away. 

“ He was a little thin man, in white linen 
coat and waistcoat, and with a large straw hat, 
and his wife, a fat woman who was doing em- 
broidery, was behind him. 

“ When she saw us take up our position 
close to their place, she murmured: ‘ I suppose 
there are no other places on the river! ' And 
136 


The Fishermen 


my wife, who was furious, replied: ‘ People 
who know how to behave make inquiries about 
the habits of the neighborhood before occu- 
pying reserved spots.’ 

“ As I did not want a fuss, I said to her: 

‘ Hold your tongue, Melie. Let them go on, 
let them go on; we shall see.’ 

“ Well, we had fastened ‘ Delila ’ under the 
willow-tree, and had landed and were fishing 
side by side, Melie and I , close to the two others ; 
but here, Monsieur, I must enter into details. 

“ We had only been there about five minutes 
when our male neighbor’s float began to go 
down two or three times, and then he pulled 
out a chub as thick as my thigh, rather less, 
perhaps, but nearly as big! My heart beat, 
and the perspiration stood on my forehead, 
and Melie said to me: ‘Well, you sot, did you 
see that ? ’ 

“Just then, Monsieur Bru, the grocer of 
Poissy, who was fond of gudgeon fishing, 
passed in a boat, and called out to me: ‘ So 
somebody has taken your usual place, Mon- 
sieur Renard?’ And I replied: ‘Yes, Mon- 
sieur Bru, there are some people in this world 
who do not know the usages of common polite- 
ness.’ 


137 


De Maupassant 


“ The little man in linen pretended not to 
hear, nor his fat lump of a wife, either/' 

Here the President interrupted him a 
second time: “Take care, you are insulting 
the widow, Madame Flameche, who is 
present/' 

Renard made his excuses: “ I beg your par- 
don, I beg your pardon, my anger carried me 
away. Well, not a quarter of an hour had 
passed when the little man caught another 
chub, and another almost immediately, and 
another five minutes later. 

“ The tears were in my eyes, and then I 
knew that Madame Renard was boiling with 
rage, for she kept on nagging at me: 'Oh! how 
horrid! Don’t you see that he is robbing you 
of your fish ? Do you think that you will 
catch anything ? Not even a frog, nothing 
whatever. Why, my hands are burning, just 
to think of it.' 

“ But 1 said to myself: ‘ Let us wait until 
twelve o'clock. Then this poaching fellow will 
go to lunch, and I shall get my place again.' 
As for me, Monsieur le President, I lunch on 
the spot every Sunday; we bring our provi- 
sions in ‘ Delila.' But there! At twelve 
o’clock, the wretch produced a fowl out of a 
138 


The Fishermen 


newspaper, and while he was eating, actually 
he caught another chub! 

“ Melie and I had a morsel also, just a 
mouthful, a mere nothing, for our heart was 
not in it. 

“ Then I took up my newspaper, to aid my 
digestion. Every Sunday I read the Gil 
Bias in the shade like that, by the side of the 
water. It is Columbine’s day, you know, 
Columbine who writes the articles in the Gil 
Bias. I generally put Madame Renard into 
a passion by pretending to know this Colum- 
bine. It is not true, for I do not know her, 
and have never seen her, but that does not 
matter; she writes very well, and then she 
says things straight out for a woman. She 
suits me, and there are not many of her sort. 

“ Well, I began to tease my wife, but she 
got angry immediately, and very angry, and 
so I held my tongue. At that moment our 
two witnesses, who are present here, Monsieur 
Ladureau and Monsieur Durdent, appeared 
on the other side of the river. We knew each 
other by sight. The little man began to fish 
again, and he caught so many that I trembled 
with vexation, and his wife said: 4 It is an un- 
commonly good spot, and we will come here 

*39 


De Maupassant 


always, Desire/ As for me, a cold shiver ran 
down my back, and Madame Renard kept re- 
peating: ‘ You are not a man; you have the 
blood of a chicken in your veins'; and sud- 
denly I said to her: ‘ Look here, I would rather 
go away, or I shall only be doing something 
foolish/ 

“ And she whispered to me as if she had 
put a red-hot iron under my nose: ‘ You are 
not a man. Now you are going to run away, 
and surrender your place! Off you go, Ba- 
zaine! ' 

“ Well, I felt that, but yet I did not move, 
while the other fellow pulled out a bream. Oh ! 
I never saw such a large one before, never! 
And then my wife began to talk aloud, as if 
she were thinking, and you can see her trick- 
ery. She said: ‘ That is what one might call 
stolen fish, seeing that we baited the place our- 
selves. At any rate, they ought to give us 
back the money we have spent on bait/ 

“ Then the fat woman in the cotton dress 
said in turn: ‘ Do you mean to call us thieves, 
Madame ? ' And they began to explain, and 
then they came to words. Oh! Lord! those 
creatures know some good ones. They shouted 
so loud, that our two witnesses, who were on 
140 


The Fishermen 


the other bank, began to call out by way of a 
joke: ‘ Less noise over there; you will prevent 
your husbands from fishing/ 

“ The fact is that neither of us moved any 
more than if we had been two tree-stumps. 
We remained there, with our noses over the 
water, as if we had heard nothing, but, by 
Jove, we heard all the same. ‘ You are a 
mere liar/ 

“ ‘ You are nothing better than a street- 
walker/ 

“ * You are only a trollop/ 

“ ‘ You are a regular strumpet/ 

“ And so on, and so on; a sailor could not 
have said more. 

“ Suddenly I heard a noise behind me, and 
turned round. It was the other one, the fat 
woman, who had fallen upon my wife with her 
parasol. Whack! whack! Melie got two of 
them, but she was furious, and she hits hard 
when she is in a rage, so she caught the fat 
woman by the hair and then, thump, thump. 
Slaps in the face rained down like ripe plums. 
I should have let them go on — women among 
themselves, men among themselves — it does 
not do to mix thte blows; but the little man in 
the linen jacket jumped up like a devil and was 
141 


De Maupassant 


going to rush at my wife. Ah! no, no, not 
that, my friend! I caught the gentleman with 
the end of my fist, crash , crash, one on the 
nose, the other in the stomach. He threw up 
his arms and legs and fell on his back into the 
river, just into the hole. 

“ I should have fished him out most cer- 
tainly, Monsieur le President, if I had had the 
time. But unfortunately the fat woman got 
the better of it, and she was drubbing Melie 
terribly. I know that I ought not to have 
assisted her while the man was drinking his 
fill, but I never thought that he would drown, 
and said to myself: ‘ Bah, it will cool him.' 

“ I therefore ran up to the women to sep- 
arate them, and all I received was scratches 
and bites. Good Lord, what creatures! Well, 
it took me five minutes, and perhaps ten, to 
separate those two viragoes. When I turned 
round, there was nothing to be seen, and the 
water was as smooth as a lake. The others 
yonder kept shouting: ‘Fish him out!’ It 
was all very well to say that, but I cannot swim 
and still less dive! 

“ At last the man from the dam came, and 
two gentlemen with boat-hooks, but it had 
taken over a quarter of an hour. He was 
142 


The Fishermen 


found at the bottom of the hole in eight feet 
of water, as I have said, but he was dead, the 
poor little man in his linen suit! There are 
the facts, such as I have sworn to. I am inno- 
cent, on my honor.” 

The witnesses having deposed to the same 
effect, the accused was acquitted 



M3 



IN HIS SWEETHEART’S LIVERY 


present she is a great 
lady, an elegant, intellect- 
ual woman, and a cele- 
brated actress. But in 
the year 1847, when our 
story begins, she was a 
beautiful, but not very 
moral girl, and then it was that the young, 
talented Hungarian poet who was the first to 
discover her gifts for the stage made her 
acquaintance. 

The slim, ardent girl, with her bright brown 
hair and her large blue eyes, attracted the 
careless poet. He loved her, and all that 
was good and noble in her nature put forth 
fresh buds and blossoms in the sunshine of 
his poetic love. 

They lived in an attic in the old imperial 
city on the Danube; she shared his poverty, 
his triumphs, and his pleasures, and would 
have become his true and faithful wife, if the 
*45 



De Maupassant 


Hungarian revolution had not torn him from 
her arms. 

The poet became the soldier of freedom. 
He followed the Magyar tricolor, and the 
Honved drums, while she was carried away 
by the current of the movement in the capital, 
and might have been seen discharging her 
musket, like a brave Amazon, at the Croats 
who were defending the town against Gorgey’s 
assaulting battalions. 

But at last Hungary was subdued, and was 
governed as if it had been a conquered country. 

It was said that the young poet had fallen 
at Temesvar. His mistress wept for him, 
and married another man, which was nothing 
either new or extraordinary. Her name was 
now Frau von Kubinyi, but her married life 
was not happy. One day she remembered 
that her lover had told her that she had talent 
for the stage, and as whatever he said had 
always proved correct, she separated from 
her husband, studied a few parts, appeared 
on the stage, and lo! the public, the critics, 
actors, and writers were lying at her feet. 

She obtained a very profitable engagement, 
and her reputation increased with every part 
she played. Before the end of a year after 
146 


In His Sweetheart’s Livery 


her first appearance, she was the lioness of 
society. Everybody paid homage to her, and 
the wealthiest men tried to obtain her favors. 
But she remained cold and reserved, until the 
General commanding the district, who was 
a handsome man, of noble bearing, and a 
gentleman in the highest sense of the word, 
approached her. 

Whether she was flattered at seeing that 
powerful man — before whom millions trem- 
bled, who had power over the life and death, 
the honor and happiness of so many thousands 

— fettered by her soft curls, or whether her 
enigmatical heart for once really felt what 
true love was, suffice it to say that in a short 
time she was his acknowledged mistress, and 
her princely lover surrounded her with the 
luxury of an Eastern queen. 

But just then a miracle occurred — the 
resurrection of a dead man. Frau von 
Kubinyi was driving through the Corso in the 
General's carriage; she was lying back negli- 
gently in the soft cushions, and looking care- 
lessly at the crowd on the pavement. Then 

— she caught sight of a common Austrian 
soldier and screamed aloud. 

Nobody heard that cry, which came from 
147 


De Maupassant 


the depths of a woman's heart, nobody saw 
how pale and how excited that woman was, 
who usually seemed made of marble, not even 
the soldier who was the cause of it. He was a 
Hungarian poet, who, like so many other 
Honveds,* now wore the uniform of an 
Austrian soldier. 

Two days later, to the poet's no small sur- 
prise, he was told to go to the General in com- 
mand as orderly. When he reported himself 
to the adjutant, he told him to go to Frau von 
Kubinyi's, and to await her orders. 

Our poet only knew her by report, but he 
hated and despised intensely the beautiful 
woman who had sold herself to the enemy of 
his country; he had no choice, however, but 
to obey. 

When he arrived at her house, he seemed 
to be expected, for the porter knew his name, 
took him into his lodge, and without any 
further explanation, told him immediately 
to put on the livery of his mistress, which was 
lying there ready for him. He ground his 
teeth, but resigned himself without a word to 

* A Hungarian word meaning Defender of the Father- 
land. The term Honved is applied to the Hungarian 
Landwehr, or militia. 


148 


In His Sweetheart’s Livery 


his wretched though laughable fate; it was 
quite clear that the actress had some purpose 
in making the poet wear her livery. He tried 
to remember whether he could formerly have 
offended her by his notices as a theatrical 
critic, but before he could arrive at any con- 
clusion, he was told to present himself to Frau 
von Kubinyi.* She evidently wished to enjoy 
his humiliation. 

He was shown into a small drawing-room, 
which was furnished with an amount of taste 
and magnificence such as he* had never seen 
before, and was told to wait. But he had 
not been alone many minutes, before the 
door-curtains were parted and Frau von 
Kubinyi came in, calm but deadly pale, in a 
splendid dressing-gown of some Turkish 
material, and he recognized his former mis- 
tress. 

“ Irma!” he exclaimed. 

The cry came from his heart, and affected 
the heart of this pleasure-surfeited woman so 
greatly that the next moment she was lying 
on the breast of the man whom she had be- 
lieved to be dead, but only for a moment, for 
he freed himself from her. 

149 


De Maupassant 


“We are fated to meet again thus!” she 
began. 

“ Not through any fault of mine,” he re- 
plied bitterly. 

“ And not through mine either,” she said 
quickly; “everybody thought that you were 
dead, and I wept for you; that is my justifica- 
tion.” 

“ You are really too kind,” he replied sar- 
castically. “ How can you condescend to 
make any excuses to me ? I wear your livery; 
you have to order, and I have to obey; our 
relative positions are clear enough.” 

Frau von Kubinyi turned away to hide her 
tears. 

“ I did not intend to hurt your feelings,” 
he continued; “but I must confess that it 
would have been better for both of us, if we 
had not met again. But what do you mean 
by making me wear your livery? Is it not 
enough that I have been robbed of my happi- 
ness ? Does it afford you any pleasure to 
humiliate me as well ? ” 

“ How can you think that ? ” the actress 
exclaimed. “ Ever since I discovered your 
unhappy lot, I have thought of nothing but 
the means of delivering you from it, and until 
150 


In His Sweetheart’s Livery 


I succeed in doing this, however, I can at least 
make it more bearable for you.” 

“ I understand,” the unhappy poet said 
with a sneer. “ And in order to do this, you 
have begged your present worshiper to turn 
your former lover into a footman.” 

“ What a thing to say to me! ” 

“ Can you find any other pleasure for it ? 
You wish to punish me for having loved 
you, idolized you, I suppose ? ” the poet con- 
tinued. “So exactly like a woman! But I 
can perfectly well understand that the sit- 
uation promises to have a fresh charm for 
you.” 

Before he could finish what he was saying, 
the actress quickly left the room; he could 
hear her sobbing, but he did not regret his 
words, and his contempt and hatred for her 
only increased when he saw the extravagance 
and the princely luxury with which she was 
surrounded. But what was the use of his 
indignation ? He was wearing her livery, he 
was obliged to wait upon her and to obey her, 
for she had the corporal’s cane at her com- 
mand. It really seemed as if he incurred the 
vengeance of the offended woman; as if the 
General’s insolent mistress wished to make 

151 


De Maupassant 


him feel her whole power; as if he were not to 
be spared the deepest humiliation. 

The General and two of Frau von Kubinyi' s 
friends, who were also servants of the Muses, 
for one was a ballet dancer and the other an 
actress, had come to tea, and he was to wait 
on them. 

While it was being made, he heard them 
laughing in the next room. The blood flew 
to his head when the butler opened the door 
and Frau von Kubinyi appeared on the Gen- 
eral's arm. She did not, however, look at 
her new footman, her former lover, trium- 
phantly or contemptuously, but gave him a 
glance of the deepest commiseration. 

Could he, after all, have wronged her ? 

Hatred and love, contempt and jealousy 
were struggling in his breast, and when he had 
to fill the glasses, the bottle shook in his hand. 

“ Is this the man ? " the General said, look- 
ing at him closely. 

Frau von Kubinyi nodded. 

“ He was evidently not born for a footman," 
the General added. 

“ And still less for a soldier," the actress 
observed. 

These words fell heavily on the unfortunate 
152 


In His Sweetheart’s Livery 


poet’s heart, but she was evidently taking his 
part, and trying to rescue him from his terrible 
position. 

Suspicion, however, once more gained the 
day. 

“ She is tired of all pleasures, and satiated 
with enjoyment,” he said to himself; “ she 
requires excitement and it amuses her to see 
the man whom she formerly loved, anckwho, 
as she knows, still loves her, tremble before 
her. And when she pleases, she can see me 
tremble; not for my life, but for fear of the 
disgrace which she can inflict upon me, at any 
moment, if it should give her any pleasure.” 

But suddenly the actress gave him a look, 
which was so sad and so imploring, that he 
looked down in confusion. 

From that time he remained in her house 
without performing any duties, and without 
receiving any orders from her; in fact he never 
saw her, and did not venture to ask after her. 
Two months had passed in this way, when the 
General unexpectedly sent for him. He 
waited, with many others, in the anteroom. 
The General came back from parade, saw him, 
and beckoned him to follow him, and as soon 
as they were alone, said: 

153 


De Maupassant 


“ You are free, as you have been allowed 
to purchase your discharge.” 

“Good heavens!” the poet stammered, 
“ how am I to — ” 

“ That is already done,” the General replied. 
“ You are free.” 

“ How is it possible ? How can I thank 
your Excellency! ” 

“ You owe me no thanks,” he replied; 
“ Frau von Kubinyi bought you out.” 

The poor poet’s heart seemed to stop; he 
could not speak, nor even stammer a word; 
but with a low bow, he rushed out and tore 
wildly through the streets, until he reached 
the mansion of the woman whom he had so 
misunderstood, quite out of breath; he must 
see her again, and throw himself at her feet. 

“ Where are you going to ? ” the porter 
asked him. 

“ To Frau von Kubinyi’s.” 

“ She is not here.” 

“ Not here ? ” 

“ She has gone away.” 

“ Gone away ? Where to ? ” 

“ She started for Paris two hours ago.” 


154 


BERTHA 



* Y old friend — one has friends 
occasionally who are much 
older than oneself — my old 
friend Doctor Bonnet had 
poften invited me to spend 
some time with him at 
Riom, and as 1 did not 
know Auvergne, I made up my mind to go 
there in the summer of 1876. 

I got there by the morning train, and the 
first person I saw on the platform was the 
doctor. He was dressed in a gray suit, and 
wore a soft, black, wide-brimmed, high- 
crowned felt hat, which was narrow at the top 
like a chimney pot, a hat which hardly anyone 
except an Auvergnat would wear, and which 
smacked of the charcoal-burner. Dressed like 
that, the doctor had the appearance of an old 
young man, with a spare body under a thin 
coat, and a large head covered with white hair. 
155 


De Maupassant 


He embraced me with that evident pleasure 
which country people feel when they meet long 
expected friends, and stretching out his arm 
said proudly: “This is Auvergne ! '' 

I saw nothing before me, except a range of 
mountains, whose summits, which resembled 
truncated cones, must have been extinct vol- 
canoes. 

Then, pointing to the name of the station, 
he said: 

“ cRiom, the fatherland of magistrates, the 
pride of the magistracy, ought rather to be 
the fatherland of doctors/' 

“ Why ? ” I asked. 

“ Why ? '' he replied with a laugh. “ If 
you transpose the letters, you have the Latin 
word mori , to die. That is the reason why I 
settled here, my young friend/ 1 

And delighted at his own joke, he carried 
me off, rubbing his hands. 

As soon as I had swallowed a cup of coffee, 
he made me go and see the town. I admired 
the chemist's house, and the other celebrated 
houses, which were all black, but as pretty as 
knickknacks, with their facades of sculptured 
stone. I admired the statue of the Virgin, 
the patroness of butchers, and he told me an 
156 


Bertha 


amusing story about this, which I will relate 
some other time. Then Doctor Bonnet said 
to me: 

“ I must beg you to excuse me for a few 
minutes while I go and see a patient, and then 
I will take you to Chatel-Guyon, so as to show 
you the general aspect of the town, and all 
the mountain chain of the Puy-de-Dome, be- 
fore lunch. You can wait for me outside; I 
shall only go upstairs and come down imme- 
diately.” 

He left me outside one of those old, gloomy, 
silent, melancholy houses which one sees in 
the provinces. This one appeared to look 
particularly sinister, and I soon discovered 
the reason. All the large windows on the 
first floor were half boarded up with wooden 
shutters. The upper part of them alone 
could be opened, as if one had wished to pre- 
vent the people who were locked up in that 
huge stone trunk from looking into the street. 

When the doctor came down again, I told 
him how it had struck me, and he replied: 

“ You are quite right; the poor creature 
who is living there must never see what is 
going on outside. She is a madwoman, or 
rather an idiot, what you Normans would call 
157 


De Maupassant 


a zJ\(Hente.* It is a miserable story, but a very 
singular pathological case at the same time. 
Shall I tell you of it ? ” 

I begged him to do so, and he continued: 

“ Twenty years ago, the owners of this 
house, who were my patients, had a daughter 
who was seemingly like all other girls. But 
I soon discovered that while her body became 
admirably developed, her intellect remained 
stationary. 

“ She began to walk very early, but could 
not talk. At first I thought she was deaf, but 
discovered that although she heard perfectly, 
she did not understand anything that was 
said to her. Violent noises made her start 
and frightened her, without her understanding 
how they were caused. 

“ She grew up into a superb woman, but 
she was dumb, from an absolute want of in- 
tellect. I tried all means to introduce a gleam 
of sense into her head, but nothing succeeded. 
I thought that I noticed that she knew her 
nurse, though as soon as she was weaned, she 
failed to recognize her mother. She could 
never pronounce that word, which is the first 
that children utter, and the last which men 
* A nothing , i. e., an idiot. 

i 5 8 


Bertha 


murmur when dying on the field of battle. 
She sometimes tried to talk, but produced 
nothing but incoherent sounds. 

“ When the weather was fine, she laughed 
continually, emitting low cries which might 
be compared to the twittering of birds. When 
it rained she cried and moaned in a mournful, 
terrifying manner, like the howling of a dog 
when death occurs in a house. 

“ She was fond of rolling on the grass, like 
young animals do, and of running about madly. 
She used to clap her hands every morning 
when the sun shone into her room, and would 
jump out of bed and insist, by signs, on being 
dressed as quickly as possible, so that she 
might get out. 

“ She did not appear to distinguish between 
people, between her mother and her nurse, or 
between her father and me, or between the 
coachman and the cook. I liked her parents, 
who were very unhappy on her account, very 
much, and went to see them nearly every day. 
1 dined with them tolerably frequently, which 
enabled me to remark that Bertha (they had 
called her Bertha) seemed to recognize the 
various dishes and to prefer some to others. 
At that time she was twelve years old, but as 
1 59 


De Maupassant 


fully formed in figure as a girl of eighteen, and 
taller than I was. Then, the idea struck me 
of developing her greediness, and by such 
means to try and produce some slight power 
of discernment into her mind — to force her, 
by the diversity of flavors, if not by reason, to 
arrive at instinctive distinctions, which would 
of themselves constitute a species of analysis 
akin to thought. Later on, by appealing to 
her senses, and by carefully making use of 
those which could serve us, we might hope to 
obtain a kind of reaction on her intellect, and 
by degrees increase the involuntary action of 
her brain. 

“ One day I put two plates before her, one 
of soup, and the other of very sweet vanilla 
cream. I made her taste each of them suc- 
cessively, then I let her choose for herself, 
and she ate the plate of cream. In a short 
time I made her very greedy, so greedy that it 
appeared as if the only idea she had in her 
head was the desire for eating. She recog- 
nized the various dishes perfectly, stretched 
out her hands toward those that she liked, 
and took hold of them eagerly, crying when 
they were taken from her. Then I thought I 
would try and teach her to come to the dining- 
160 


Bertha 


room, when the dinner bell rang. It took a 
long time, but I succeeded in the end. In her 
vacant intellect, there was a fixed correlation 
between the sound and her taste, a correspon- 
dence between two senses, an appeal from one 
to the other, and consequently a sort of con- 
nection of ideas, — if one can term an instinc- 
tive hyphen between two organic functions 
an idea, — and so I carried my experiments 
further, and taught her, with much difficulty, 
to recognize meal-times on the face of the clock. 

“ It was impossible for me for a long time 
to attract her attention to the hands, but I 
succeeded in making her remark the clock- 
work and the striking apparatus. The means 
I employed were very simple. I asked them 
not to have the bell rung for lunch, but that 
everybody should get up and go into the 
dining-room when the little brass hammer 
struck twelve o’clock; but I found great diffi- 
culty in making her learn to count the strokes. 
She ran to the door each time she heard the 
clock strike, but by degrees she learned that 
all the strokes had not the same value as re- 
garded meals, and she frequently fixed her 
eyes, guided by her ears, on the dial of the 
clock. 


161 


De Maupassant 


“ When I noticed that, I took care, every 
day at twelve and at six o’clock, to place my 
fingers on the figures twelve and six, as soon 
as the moment she was waiting for, had ar- 
rived. I soon noticed that she attentively 
followed the motion of the small brass hands, 
which I had often turned in her presence. 

“She had understood! Perhaps I should 
rather say that she had seized the idea. I 
had succeeded in getting the knowledge, or 
rather the sensation of the time into her, just 
as is the case with carp, who certainly have 
no clocks, but know that they are fed every 
day at a certain time. 

“ When once I had obtained that result, all 
the clocks and watches in the house occupied 
her attention almost exclusively. She spent 
her time in looking at them, in listening to 
them, and in waiting for meal-times, and once 
something very funny happened. The strik- 
ing apparatus of a pretty little Louis XVI. 
clock that hung at the head of her bed had got 
out of order, and she noticed it. She sat for 
twenty minutes, with her eyes on the hands, 
waiting for it to strike ten, but when the hand 
passed the figure, she was astonished at not 
hearing anything. So stupefied was she, in- 
162 


Bertha 


deed, that she sat down, no doubt over- 
whelmed by a feeling of violent emotion, such 
as attacks us in the face of some terrible catas- 
trophe. She had the wonderful patience to 
wait until eleven o'clock, in order to see what 
would happen, but, as she naturally heard 
nothing, she was suddenly either seized with 
a wild fit of rage at having been deceived and 
imposed upon by appearances, or else was 
overcome by the fear which a frightened crea- 
ture feels at some terrible mystery, or by the 
furious impatience of a passionate individual 
who meets with some obstacle. She took up 
the tongs from the fireplace, and struck the 
clock so violently that she broke it to pieces 
in a moment. 

“ It was evident, therefore, that her brain 
did act and calculate, obscurely it is true, and 
within very restricted limits, for I could never 
succeed in making her distinguish persons as 
she distinguished the time. To stir her in- 
tellect, it was necessary to appeal to her pas- 
sions, in the material sense of the word, and 
we soon had another, and alas! a very terrible 
proof of this ! 

* * * * * * * 

“ She had grown up into a splendid girl; a 
163 


De Maupassant 


perfect type of a race, a sort of lovely and 
stupid Venus. She was sixteen, and I have 
rarely seen such perfection of form, such 
suppleness, and such regular features. I said 
she was a Venus; yes, a fair, stout, vigorous 
Venus, with large, bright, vacant eyes, blue 
as the flowers of the flax plant. She had a 
large mouth with full lips, the mouth of a 
glutton, of a sensualist, a mouth made for 
kisses. Well, one morning her father came 
into my con suiting- room, with a strange look 
on his face, and sitting down, without even 
replying to my greeting, he said: 

“ ‘ I want to speak to you about a very 
serious matter. Would it be possible — 
would it be possible for Bertha to marry ? ’ 

“ ‘ Bertha to marry! Why, it is quite im- 
possible !’ 

“ ‘Yes, I know, I know/ he replied. ‘ But 
reflect, doctor — don’t you think — perhaps 
— we hoped — if she had children — it would 
be a great shock to her, but a great happiness, 
and who knows whether maternity might not 
rouse her intellect ? 

“ I was in a state of great perplexity. He 
was right, and it was possible that such a new 
situation, and that wonderful instinct of 
164 


maternity which beats in the hearts of the 
lower animals as it does in the heart of a 
woman, which makes a hen fly at a dog’s jaws 
to defend her chickens, might bring about a 
revolution, an utter change in her vacant 
mind, and set the motionless mechanism of 
her thoughts into movement. And then, 
moreover, I immediately remembered a per- 
sonal instance. Some years previously I had 
possessed a spaniel bitch which was so stupid 
that I could do nothing with her, but when 
she had had pups she became, if not exactly 
clever, yet as intelligent as many other dogs 
who have not been thoroughly broken. 

“ As soon as I foresaw the possibility of 
this, the wish to get Bertha married grew on 
me, not so much out of friendship for her and 
her poor parents, as from scientific curiosity. 
What would happen ? It was a singular prob- 
lem, and I said to her father : 

“ ‘ Perhaps you are right. You might 
make the attempt — but — but you will never 
find a man to consent to marry her.’ 

“ ‘ I have found somebody/ he said in a low 
voice. 

“ I was dumfounded, and said: ‘ Somebody 


De Maupassant 


really suitable ? Some one of your own rank 
and position in society ? ' 

“ ‘ Decidedly/ he replied. 

“ ‘ Oh! And may I ask his name ? ' 

u ‘ 1 came on purpose to tell you and to con- 
sult you. It is Monsieur Gaston du Boys de 
Lucelles/ 

“ I felt inclined to exclaim: ‘ What a wretch/ 
but I held my tongue, and after a few moments' 
silence, I said: 

“‘Oh! Very good. I see nothing against 
it/ 

“ The poor man shook me heartily by the 
hand, and said: 

“ ‘ She is to be married next month/ 
******* 

“ Monsieur Gaston du Boys de Lucelles was 
a scapegrace of good family, who, after having 
spent all that he had inherited from his father, 
and having incurred debts by all kinds of 
doubtful means, had been trying to discover 
some other way of obtaining money. Hence 
this method. He was a good-looking young 
fellow, and in capital health, but fast — one 
of that odious tribe of provincial fast men — 
and appeared to me to be the sort of a hus- 
band who could be got rid of later, by making 
1 66 


him an allowance. He came to the house to 
pay his addresses, and to strut about before 
the idiot girl, who, however, seemed to please 
him. He brought her flowers, kissed her 
hands, sat at her feet, and looked at her with 
affectionate eyes; but she took no notice of 
any of his attentions, and made no distinc- 
tion between him and the other persons about 
her. 

“ However, the marriage took place, and 
you may guess how excited my curiosity was. 
I went to see Bertha the next day, to try and 
discover from her looks whether any feelings 
had been roused in her, but I found her just 
the same as she was every day, wholly taken 
up with the clock and dinner, while he, on the 
contrary, appeared really in love, and tried to 
rouse his wife's spirits and affection by little 
endearments and such caresses as one bestows 
on a kitten. He could think of nothing better. 

“ I called upon the married couple pretty 
frequently, and I soon perceived that the young 
woman knew her husband, and gave him those 
eager looks which she had hitherto only be- 
stowed on sweet dishes. 

“ She followed his movements, knew his 
step on the stairs or in the neighboring rooms 


De Maupassant 


and clapped her hands when he came in. Her 
face was changed and brightened by the flames 
of profound happiness and of desire. She 
loved him with her whole body and with all 
her being, to the very depths of her poor, 
weak soul, and with all her heart, the poor 
heart of some grateful animal. It was really 
a delightful and innocent picture of simple 
passion, of carnal and yet modest passion, 
such as nature planted in mankind, before 
man complicated and disfigured it by all the 
various shades of sentiment. But he soon 
grew tired of this ardent, beautiful, dumb 
creature, and did not spend more than an hour 
a day with her, thinking it sufficient to de- 
vote his nights to her, and she began to 
suffer in consequence. She used to wait for 
him from morning till night, with her eyes 
on the clock. She did not even look after the 
meals now, for he took all his away from 
home, Clermont, Chatel-Guyon, Royat, no 
matter where, as long as he was not obliged 
to come home. 

“She began to grow thin; every other 
thought, every other wish, every other ex- 
pectation, and every other confused hope dis- 
appeared from her mind, and the hours during 
1 68 


Bertha 


which she did not see him became hours of 
terrible suffering to her. Soon he used fre- 
quently not to come home at night; he spent 
them with women at the Casino at Royat, and 
did not come home until daybreak. But she 
never went to bed before he returned. She 
would remain sitting motionless in an easy- 
chair, with her eyes fixed on the clock, which 
turned so slowly and regularly round the 
china face on which the hours were painted. 

“ When she heard the trot of his horse in 
the distance, she would sit up with a start. 
When he came into the room, she would get 
up with the movements of a phantom, and 
point to the clock, as if to say to him: ‘ Look 
how late it is! ' 

“ He began to be afraid of this amorous and 
jealous, half-witted woman, and flew into a 
rage, like brutes do; and one night he even 
went so far as to strike her, so they sent for 
me. When I arrived she was writhing and 
screaming in a terrible crisis of pain, anger, 
passion, how do I know what ? Can anyone 
tell what goes on in such undeveloped brains ? 

“ I calmed her by subcutaneous injections 
of morphine, and forbade her to see that man 
169 


De Maupassant 


again, for I saw clearly that marriage would 
infallibly kill her, by degrees. 

******* 

“ Then she went mad! Yes, my dear friend, 
that idiot has gone mad. She is always think- 
ing of him and waiting for him; she waits for 
him all day and night, awake or asleep, at this 
very moment, ceaselessly. When I saw her 
getting thinner and thinner, never taking her 
eyes off the clocks, I had them removed from 
the house. I thus make it impossible for her 
to count the hours, or to remember, from her 
indistinct reminiscences, at what time he used 
to come home. I hope to destroy the recollec- 
tion of it in time, and to extinguish that ray 
of thought which I had kindled with so much 
difficulty. 

“ The other day I tried an experiment. I 
offered her my watch. She took it and looked 
at it for some time; then she began to scream 
terribly, as if the sight of that little object had 
suddenly aroused her recollection, which was 
beginning to grow indistinct. She is pitiably 
thin now, with hollow and brilliant eyes, and 
she walks up and down ceaselessly, like a wild 
beast does in its cage. I have had bars put to 
the windows, and have had the seats fixed to 
170 


Bertha 


the floor, so as to prevent her from looking 
to see whether he is coming. 

“Oh! her poor parents! What a life they 
must lead! ” 

We had got to the top of the hill, and the 
doctor turned round and said to me: 

“ Look at Riom from here/' 

The gloomy town looked like some ancient 
city. Behind it, a green, wooded plain studded 
with towns and villages, and bathed in a soft 
blue haze, extended until it was lost in the dis- 
tance. Far away, on my right, there was a 
range of lofty mountains with round summits, 
or truncated cones, and the doctor began to 
enumerate the villages, towns, and hills, and 
to give me the history of all of them. But I 
did not listen to him; I was thinking of nothing 
but the mad woman, and only saw her. She 
seemed to be hovering over that vast extent 
of country like a mournful ghost, and I asked 
him abruptly: 

“ What has become of the husband ? ” 

My friend seemed rather surprised, but after 
a few moments’ hesitation, he replied: 

“ He is living at Royat, on an allowance that 
they make him, and is quite happy; he leads 
a very fast life.” 

171 


De Maupassant 


As we were going slowly back, both of us 
silent and rather low-spirited, an English dog- 
cart, drawn by a thoroughbred horse, came up 
behind us and passed us rapidly. The doctor 
took me by the arm: 

“ There he is,” he said. 

I saw nothing except a gray felt hat, cocked 
over one ear, above a pair of broad shoulders, 
driving off in a cloud of dust. 



172 


A MESSAGE OF LOVE 
IN THE GARDEN OF THE TUI LERIES 

OME to me, little child, 
whose mother sweet 
Makes my poor heart with 
throbs of passion beat. 
Upon this bench she often 
loves to stay, 

Watching her darling child 
before her play. 

Pale is she, and her hair is such as gleams 
Through fancy's softest, most delicious dreams. 
I see it now, above her forehead lie, 

Bright as the radiance of the starlight sky. 
Come to me, dearest child, and let me press 
Thy rosy lips with deepest tenderness. 

Let me once more thy large blue eyes behold, 
And plant one kiss upon thy curls of gold. 
Thus, little darling, would I make thee bear 
A load of kisses to her, unaware. 

And thus, when thou returnest to her side, 
And the soft darkness comes with eventide, 
173 



De Maupassant 


And when thy little arms at last are thrown 
Around that tapering neck I may not own. 
Upon thy rosy lip she still may find 
And on those locks of gold she loves to bind, 
The burning kiss, my lips have left behind. 
Ah! sweet shall that be as the dawn of love. 
Then shall she say, while trembling flushes 
move 

Across the cheeks she guards from looks of 
mine, 

And takes my kiss from those curled locks of 
thine, 

“ What is it on my daughter’s brow to-night 
That stirs my bosom with this strange de- 
light ? " 



174 


DISCOVERY 



^WAS a child, I loved to read 


Worn patiently by many a 


And warfare, and the 
heavy coat of mail 


I loved those paladins, 
who once set sail. 


of fight 


doughty knight. 


To wrest the Holy Sepulcher from hands 
Of Paynims, and who died in foreign lands. 

I loved that English Richard, at whose name 
My young heart beat with ardor, when they 


told 


How, on returning from the fields of fame. 
He, for a necklace fashioned out of gold, 
As links of his triumphant trophy, chose 
The heads that he had smitten off from foes. 

The Queen of Beauty gave, to deck my crest, 
Her favor, and I dangled at my side 


175 


De Maupassant 


A cane for scimitar, and forth, in quest 
Of some adventure, stepped with knightly 
pride; 

And at the flowers, with valiant arm, I hewed; 
And all the lawn with bud and blossom strewed. 

And in the open air, a seat of stone 

I covered with a mossy cushion green; 

And this I counted as a royal throne. 

I hated even kings who overween. 

And, for a royal crown to deck my brow, 

I chose a garland from a budding bough. 

Ah! lapped in happiness the days went by; 

And once a fair companion joined my side; 
Nor was the maid reluctant to comply, 

When my bright crown, my court, my king- 
dom wide 

I offered her, and pointed o’er the main, 

To all the castles I had built in Spain. 

Beneath the chestnut-trees she took her seat; 

And she was beautiful, and in her eye, 
Liquid and blue and bright, I seemed to meet 
Another universe, another sky; 

And at her feet I sat the whole day long, 

As if I listened to some dreamland song. 

176 


Discovery 


Ah, wherefore did I leave that cheerful place, 
Why did 1 fling away the happiness 
Of gazing on that maiden's tender face ? 

Why was Columbus filled with such distress, 
When, thro' the fading vapors of the night, 
He saw a new world rising into sight ? 



177 



TO A CHILD 



J HY dost thou weep, my 
child ? for hast thou found 
So soon the thorns that 
hem life s pathway round ? 
>Run, weave thee garlands 
of the summer flowers! 
Tears ill become thy fresh 
and tender hours. 

All has its season, thine is meant for song; 
Tis thine to sing, my sweet, the summer long. 
Run, with light step across the thickets leap, 
For all the world seems sad, when children 
weep, 

And all creation happy when they smile again. 
Like bursts of sunlight after summer rain. 
Smiles on the lips of childhood e’er should 
play. 

And birds beside their cradles pour their lay, 
For God bends listening, ’mid the choiring 
throng, 

To children’s laughter and the wild bird’s song. 
179 


ON THE 

DEATH OF LOUIS BOUILHET 


EAD is my master, dead; 
oh, why should fate 
Have smitten one so kind, 
so good, so great ? 

Thus, Lord, thou choosest 
by thy side to place. 
Bereaving us, the loftiest 
of our race. 

Feeble our generation, so we die, 

In vain to heaven the sad survivors cry. 

Does heaven rejoice when we our best resign ? 
Why didst thou make them mortal, Power 
divine ? 

Can their death add to glory such as Thine ? 
Dead is he ? What is death ? There naught 
we see 

Remaining, but a lifeless effigy. 

Naught of the man; not e’en the kindly smile, 
Which won the hearts it never could beguile; 
That seemed to whisper with a look benign, 
181 



De Maupassant 


“Thou art my friend; I love thee, friend of 
mine/' 

That intellectual eye, kind, open, clear, — 

O what a doom, within the grave to bear 
Obstruction’s fixity, buried beneath 
The boundless, unplumbed mystery of death. 
Yet since from dust of earth the buried com 
Starts forth again and in new life is born, 
Since naught can perish in creation’s range, 
Since all is but development and change, 

We know that he who left us yesterday, 

Has but laid down his earthly cloak of clay; 
But whither has his spirit sped away ? 

Has it left us to join the company 
Of the great brother-dead who looked for it on 
high ? 

What unknown world before its vision lies, 
This soul, that was a poet, one whose eyes 
Were wide with wonder and with love’s sur- 
prise. 

Oft from those eyes a glance of splendor came 
As potent and as dazzling as a flame. 

Now those fixed orbs our inmost soul affright, 
They seemed amazed as if they knew to sight 
Returned, alert, the soul that once had lent 
them light! 

Ah, had you seen his orchard blooming gay, 
182 


On the Death of Louis Bouilhet 


And heard him chat with me the hours away; 
How the old poet bared his heart to me 
In talk — then buried in deep reverie 
Would leave me, for the man was nature's 
child. 

Ah, poor Bouilhet ! he dead ? the good ? the 
mild 

In spirit ? — for indeed he seemed to me, 

A new Messiah who had brought the key 
To that high heaven where slumbers poesy. 
And now behold him dead, gone is his soul 
To that eternal world which is the goal 
Of genius, yet his spirit from on high 
Doubtless still sees us, and can hear the cry 
Of one whose heartlove for the dead can never 
die! 



83 




CONCERNING THE COMPLETE WRITINGS 
OF GUY DE MAUPASSANT AND THE 
FRENCH ACADEMY. 

E French Academy had 
its birth in the drawing- 
rooms of the Hotel Ram- 
bouillet. Conrart and Voi- 
ture, aided by the influence 
of Cardinal Richelieu, 
crystallized the genius of 
the French literature of their time into the 
Institution which is now known by that name. 
The Academy has been the nurse of literature 
in France ever since then, and has thrown 
off four other branches, which cover the 
regions of philosophy, science, and art. This 
interesting little bit of history has a direct 
bearing upon the publication of the Complete 
Writings of Guy de Maupassant, now in Eng- 
lish for the first time. When M. Walter 
Dunne was ready to publish the complete 



See Publisher’s complimentary offer on last page. 
185 


De Maupassant 


writings of Guy de Maupassant in English, 
he wrote to each occupant of the forty arm- 
chairs of the French Academy, telling them 
of his enterprise and asking them to cable 
their opinion of De Maupassant’s achievement 
and genius. With this request they complied, 
and here are a few of the cable greetings: 


Un des plus grands ecrivains du siecle. 

SARDOU. 

Translation — One of the greatest writers of the 
century. 


Maupassant, realiste cruel, excellent ecrivain. 

FRANCOIS COPPEE. 

> 

Translation — Maupassant was cruelly realistic 
and a superb writer. 


La plume de Maupassant, incisive et coloree, est 
excellemment fran^aise. 

SULLY-PRUDHOMME. 

Translation — Maupassant’s pen was incisive, full 
of color, and essentially French. 


See Publisher’s complimentary offer on last page, 

1 86 


The Complete Writings 


Le plus amusant des pessimistes, le plus tragique 
des vaudevillistcs. 

BRUNETIERE. 

Translation — The most amusing of the pessi- 
mists and the most serious of the vaudevillists. 


Maupassant incarna le clair genie de notre langue. 

MELCHIOR DE VOGUE. 

Translation — In Maupassant the transparent gen- 
ius of our language was incarnated. 


Maupassant, grand parmi nos plus grands ecri- 
vains. 

LUDOVIC HALEVY. 

Translation — Maupassant is great among our 
greatest writers. 


La vie et Maupassant, lequel imita l’autre ? 

FAGUET. 

Translation — Life and De Maupassant: which 
copied the other ? 


See Publisher’s complimentary offer on last page. 


De Maupassant 


Ecrivain savoureux, conteur excellent, romancier 
plus indiscutable. 

ANDRE THEURIET. 

Translation — Racy as a writer, a splendid story- 
teller, and a romance writer beyond dispute. 


WHAT OTHERS THINK OF 
DE MAUPASSANT. 

Here are a few pregnant criticisms of De 
Maupassant by Russian, English, Spanish, 
and French Critics of note. They tell more 
forcibly than any essay the classic worth of 
the great Norman writer. 

ANDREW LANG : 

“ The tenderness of Fielding, the graphic 
power of Smollett, the biting satire of Dean 
Swift, mingled and reincarnated in Gallic 
guise and named De Maupassant.” 

ANATOLE FRANCE, Author of La Vie 
Litter air e ; Member of the French Acad- 
emy : 


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1 88 


The Complete Writings 


“ Maupassant was the painter of humanity 
in words. Without hatred, without love, 
without anger, without pity, merciless as fire, 
immutable as fate, he holds a mirror up to 
life without attempting judgment/' 

JAMES FITZMAURICE-KELLEY, Member 
of the Spanish Academy : 

“ Maupassant’s style is exceedingly simple 
and exceedingly strong. He was the Father 
of the Modern Short Story.” 

PAUL BOURGET, Member of the French 
Academy : 

"It is enough that the critics of to-day 
place Guy de Maupassant among our classic 
writers. He has his place in the ranks of 
pure French genius with the Regniers, the 
La Fontaines, the Molieres.” 

LEON TOLSTOI: 

“ Maupassant’s Une Vie is, to my mind, 
the greatest novel produced in France since 
Victor Hugo wrote Les EMistrables . ... I 


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189 


De Maupassant 


love his sincerity, his power, and the beauty 
of his style.” 

HENRY JAMES : 

“ Maupassant achieved the miracle of a 
fresh tone. He was a man of genius to whom 



short cuts were disclosed 


the night.” > 

EMILE FAGUET, Member of the French 
Academy : 

“ Compared with Maupassant's novels all 
others, even Hugo's, seem forced and unreal 
to me. To outward impressions his mind 
and pen offered the sensitiveness of a pho- 
tographic film.'' 

RENfi DOUMIC : 

“ Voltaire said that no one annotated Ra- 
cine because the only possible note would be 
4 Admirable, sublime!' So, at the end of 
Maupassant's stories we can only write: 
‘This is perfection!"' 


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190 


The Complete Writings 


DE MAUPASSANT — THE CLASSIC REALIST 

The school of romantic realism began with 
Prosper Merimee, was continued by Balzac, 
and culminated in De Maupassant. De Mau- 
passant bears the title, in France, England 
and the United States, of the “ Father of the 
Modern Short Story/’ His ten long years of 
study under Flaubert gave him an insight 
into Flaubert’s methods, which, joined to his 
own magnificent powers of description, enabled 
him at one bound — by the publication of the 
story called Houle de Suif — to attain the 
highest rung of the ladder. 


THE NEW YORK HERALD, REVIEWING 
THE VOLUMES, SAYS: 

“ These Romances deal with innumerable de- 
tails of the human comedy as it presented 
itself to Maupassant’s eve r-ob servant eyes. 
He has given us tales of travel and adventure, 
of mystery and dread, of strange medical 
experiences, of love and lust, of comedy and 


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I 9 I 


De Maupassant 


of pathos that hovers upon the borders of 
comedy, of tragedy that is sometimes hideous 
and sometimes grotesque. He has painted 
the humors and the sorrows in the lives of 
his native Normandy's peasantry and gentry; 
he has described the petty miseries of Parisian 
clerks and cocottes, he has satirized the follies 
of Parisian society. In presenting this large 
panorama, moving to tears and laughter, the 
artist remains himself unmoved. He pre- 
serves his sanity and clearness of view even 
in the tales which we now know were written 
when he himself was hovering on the verge 
of insanity. He is as impartial as nature, as 
pitiless as that higher art which simulates 
nature." 


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192 


The Complete Writings 


CRITICAL OPINIONS OF PROMINENT MEM- 
BERS OF THE ALLIANCE-FRANCAISE 
IN AMERICA. 

GEORGES CANTY, Formerly Chief of the 
Beaux-Arts in Paris, and now Secretary of 
the Alliance- Francaise, New York City. 

“ M. WALTER DUNNE, 

135 Fifth Avenue, New York City. 

Dear Sir: 

You have done me the honor to ask my opinion of 
the genius of De Maupassant. This is what I think 
of him : 

Maupassant without doubt was one of the greatest 
writers of the nineteenth century. To strength of 
expression no one more than he has joined the clarity, 
the exactness, and superb elegance of style, which 
above all are the essential qualities of the French 
tongue. 

He has not painted man either better or worse 
than he really is, but he has painted man in all his 
true humanity. 

He has given us the reality of life, without illusion 
— admittedly with some extremely strong presenta- 


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193 


De Maupassant 


tions — but always with a verity and sincerity, 
and also with such a complete effacement of his 
own personality that he compels us to accept 
him as the Prince of Realism in the highest sense of 
the term, and to place him with Balzac, with Flaubert, 
and with Zola, while at the same time he shows him- 
self superior to them by reason of the wondrous 
simplicity of his style. GEORGES CANTY.” 

PROF. J. DYNELEY PRINCE, Professor 
in Columbia University, New York City. 

“ M. WALTER DUNNE, 

135 Fifth Avenue, New York City. 

Dear Sir: 

I am delighted that we are to have a complete 
edition of the Works of Guy de Maupassant. No 
author has excelled him in the qualities of lucid ob- 
servation and exact description. What is still more 
important for the thinking public is the matchless 
power with which he was able, in many cases, to 
penetrate the veil of outward appearance and reach 
the true but hidden aspect of visible conditions. 

Yours very truly, 

J. DYNELEY PRINCE.” 


See Publisher’s complimentary offer on last page. 
194 


The Complete Writings 


PRINCIPAL OF INSTITUTE TISNE, 533 
West End Avenue, New York. 

“M. WALTER DUNNE, 

135 Fifth Avenue, New York City. 

Dear Sir: 

Of Maupassant it is difficult to say which is most 
admirable: the clear beauty of style, the deep insight 
into human nature, the strange faculty to picture and 
to move men’s passions, or the simplicity with which 
great overpowering effects are wrought. 

Very sincerely yours, 

HENRIETTE TISNE.” 



See Publisher’s complimentary offer on last page. 

*95 


PERSONAL 



A COMPLIMENTARY OLEER 
BY THE PUBLISHER. 


On request, I shall take pleasure in sending 
you, FREE OF CHARGE, an artistic Bro- 
chure descriptive of our Definitive English 
Edition of the Novels, Short Stories, Comedies, 
Travels and Verse of GUY DE MAUPAS- 


SANT. 


This complete edition is printed privately, 
and issued for subscribers only. 

Simply send Postal Card, giving name and 
address. 

M. WALTER DUNNE, 

135 Fifth Avenue, 

New York City. 



196 










.* 





